Our Capabilities: Pre-Liquidity Planning

Having guided many startup entrepreneurs and executives through liquidity events, both from investment banking and wealth management perspectives, William Blair can help you identify the most important questions to ask as you prepare for a liquidity event.

Questions to Consider

Are you a company founder or family business owner considering the sale of your business?

Looking to recapitalize through a round of growth funding or private equity investment?

Expecting to sell private shares on the secondary markets?

If you are a company founder or family business owner approaching a liquidity event, we bring expertise, strategic thinking, and best practices to help you understand and plan for the financial implications of a transaction. Critical decisions regarding your personal planning goals are best made well in advance of a transaction. Our professionals have worked with hundreds of clients from both the wealth management and investment banking perspectives and begin with the most important question: What do you hope to achieve with the sale or recap of your business? From there, we provide guidance to help you maximize value creation, employ strategies to improve tax efficiency while protecting assets, and ultimately achieve your longer-term goals.

Client Story

Clients were interested in expanding their business and securing growth capital. Working with their William Blair wealth advisor, the firm’s investment bankers introduced them to a private equity firm that injected capital to grow the business exponentially over the next five years. The William Blair pre-liquidity planning team was brought in to advise the founders from a personal planning perspective, including managing the family’s personal finances, and developing tax-efficient strategies for estate and philanthropic planning.

The team worked closely with the family’s lead advisors to develop a financial plan, helping manage cash flow and meet tax payments. It identified multiple opportunities to shield the future growth of the company from federal estate tax. The team collaborated on establishing a family office, which integrated tax, legal, and philanthropic guidance and gave the clients a cohesive planning structure. Working hand in hand with William Blair’s philanthropy strategy professionals, the team established a public charity, a private family foundation, and a donor-advised fund, which optimized tax efficiencies and helped the clients build a roadmap of their philanthropic intent. Involving the pre-liquidity planning team early in the process allowed the client to focus on the business and laid the groundwork for future transactions and planning objectives.

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