Acquisition International - M&A Awards 2017 9 Environmental Due Diligence Firm of the Year 2017 WSP WSP provide commercially focussed environmental due diligence support for acquisition and divestments as part of M&A transactions, and environmental compliance supporting corporate governance as well as refinancing deals. Graham provides us with more information on the firm’s services in this area and how it works to ensure that clients receive the services they need. “Here at WSP, our environmental due diligence (EDD) team works globally, across a diverse range of industry sectors. Our global presence means we are able to engage our in-house expertise to support any transaction, anywhere in the world. We have a broad client base which includes investors, industry, lenders, large corporates, lawyers, corporate finance professionals, private equity and co-professionals both in the UK and globally. “Within the M&A space, our assessments are typically focussed on two main areas – ‘Legacy issues’ such as contaminated land liability, and asbestos and Environmental Health & Safety (EHS) compliance – enabling us to quantify potential liabilities and allow our clients to understand environmental risk, whether it be on a single site or wider portfolio. “In addition, we are also able to draw upon specialist in-house expertise in areas including asbestos services, energy management, environment compliance and permitting, flood risk, intrusive site investigation, health and safety, sustainability, waste management and whole site remediation.” To ensure that clients always receive the highest possible standard of service, Graham and his team firmly believe that local M&A deals are just as important as large, global ones, as he is keen to highlight. “Whilst we have significant global reach, at WSP we firmly believe that our home market and contacts are where most of our projects originate. We have worked closely with a large proportion of our clients over many years to forge strong relationships within the regions. I am a firm believer that, wherever possible, local projects should be managed by local people. “A recent example (Project Sargon II) involved our Leeds based team working closely with the Pinsent Masons (legal) and Deloitte (corporate finance) teams in Leeds in support of the divestment of a specialist hose manufacturing business comprising three sites based in West Yorkshire in a deal worth £61.4m. In contrast, we also recently advised on a WSP is one of the world’s leading environmental consultancies, with more than 500 offices in 39 countries worldwide and over 36,000 people. We caught up with Graham Duffield to learn more about the firm and the range of services it provides. MA170020 €7.3bn deal, involving EHS assessments of brewery sites across Central and Eastern Europe in support of Asahi’s acquisition of ABI in conjunction with Rothschild & Co. The ABI deal involved a UK based client facing management team co-ordinating our local in-country offices to support the assessments across Europe.” Timing is also a crucial factor in any M&AA deal, whether it be local or international, and as such WSP focuses on providing quick turnarounds for its clients, as Graham emphasises. “Typical timescales for completion of a single site transaction are ten working days, including the site inspection, although we are often asked to expedite timescales in order to meet deal completion deadlines. Identifying key environmental issues within a tight transactional deadline is a key skill, particularly on complex or multi-site projects, and forms a vital facet of WSP’s EDD capability. Highlighting key environmental concerns and financially quantifying associated potential liabilities within rigid timeframes is invaluable to our clients, and is one of the main reasons they retain us.” In his concluding comments, Graham outlines how WSP sets itself apart from its competitors and marks itself out as the best possible option for its clients thanks to its dedicated and experienced staff. “Ultimately, working with our clients to understand the context of a deal and providing tailored, bespoke advice is vital, and this is one of WSP’s greatest strengths. We listen. Every deal is different, and by engaging with clients as early as possible in the process, we are able to put them in the driving seat. Our ability to pull on both our remediation specialists to quantify the cost on potential unknowns – like a chlorinated solvent spill - as well as our broader Technical Due Diligence colleagues to assess the life expectancy of various assets makes a material difference to the value of our advice on a bid basis. We also look to cost savings and opportunities for clients whether this is through process change (large scale reduction in water usage and disposal) or significant energy savings and renewable opportunities. “Personally, I am a great believer in encouraging staff to gain as much client exposure as possible as early as possible in their career, and this is one of the main reasons why all our colleagues in the EDD team have such a commercially focussed approach, setting us apart from our competitors and will remain our ongoing focus moving forward.” Company: WSP Contact: Graham Duffield Contact Email:
[email protected] Address: Three White Rose Office Park, Millshaw Park Lane, Leeds, LS11 0DL Website: www.wsp.com