large corporations; buy-side work, typically for large, public companies or major multi-nationals and sponsor-backed chemical platforms; leveraged transactions involving raising debt and/or equity capital, strategic advisory analysis, and transaction fairness opinions and valuations.

From a mergers and acquisitions perspective, no industry is more challenging than chemicals. Since their founding, they have encountered and resolved almost every transactional issue imaginable: legacy superfund sites, contaminated groundwater and soil, open-ended TSCA exposure, carve outs of troubled assets, tax matters, family disputes, underfunded pensions, potential Foreign Corrupt Practices Act violations, minority shareholder litigation, and distressed or bankruptcy situations, among others. Addressing these issues, and having the persistence to go on and complete a successful transaction, has become the heart of their business.

What they have come to understand is that this hard-earned experience is a competitive advantage for Grace Matthews, and for their clients. There is no shortcut to developing expertise. You do it with bumps, bruises and a lot of shoe leather. They always take a very detailed approach in understanding their client, their business, and all the relevant circumstances that could impact a merger or acquisition, because they understand that minimizing risk is as important as maximizing value.