A leading provider of innovative outdoor sports and recreation products was looking to divest of a product line in the first of several divestitures supporting their portfolio rationalization strategy.
CHALLENGE
A sportswear manufacturer was embarking on multiple acquisitions to create quicker product turnaround by broadening its supply chain. The company had completed two acquisitions and realized they were not positioned to successfully close and integrate at the pace required to achieve its strategic goals of scaling the business.
APPROACH
As the company had been working on selling a global product line to a PE buyer, the company was finding that they were lacking the full divestiture expertise to negotiate against a PE firm. A Separation Management Office was established to kick-off and support the sale from negotiations through to close and separation execution.
Before sign, a Divestiture Management Office (DMO) was established and full governance structure was put in place to establish clarity and control over the process. The key stakeholders were part of the kick-off, perimeter definition, and negotiation process.
The team prepared the supporting schedule of services to get to Sign and developed the full transition services agreements before Close. The functional scope for the TSAs and separation planning included the following areas:
· Finance & Accounting
· IT
· HR
· Legal
· Facilities
· Customer Service
· Distribution
RESULTS
Launching the DMO before sign supported gaining key stakeholder buy-in and further clarity on what was in and what was out. Since this was the first of several divestitures, it set the company up to gain the deal experience, confidence and supporting tools for future divestitures.