Prerequisites: Admission is by permission only and interested students should send a resume and a cover letter to the instructor at vbosiljevac@law.harvard.edu

For early admissions, the application deadline is November 5 for LLM and upper-level JD students, and November 15 for 1L students. Please note that class capacity is limited. Applications submitted after November 15 will be considered on a rolling basis, subject to space availability.

Cross-registrants are encouraged to apply and should submit their applications by January 20.

Exam Type: No Exam

The goal of this class is to explain the strategy and investment thinking behind mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and leveraged buyout (LBO) transactions, and to provide students with the investment banking and private equity toolkit used by Wall Street firms to assess and model these transactions.

Students will learn how to model and evaluate mergers, acquisitions, and LBOs in Excel, as investment bankers and private equity professionals do (background topics such as accounting will be covered). They will learn about the strategic reasons and tactics for mergers and acquisitions, LBOs, corporate divestitures, restructurings, and hostile takeovers from the perspectives of investment bankers and private equity professionals. Case studies of mergers, acquisitions, and LBOs drawn from a variety of industries around the world will be examined.

The class workload and assignments will be challenging, requiring students to apply the concepts, tools, and techniques they have learned to real-world problems. Active participation is required.

There is no final exam. Instead, there will be a final take-home project requiring students to build an advanced merger model or an advanced LBO model, as well as a pitchbook, as one would prepare in an investment bank or private equity firm. Course materials will include textbooks, cases, and modeling video tutorials.

No prior experience in finance is required. In fact, the ideal student is highly motivated and does not need prior practical investment banking experience.

This course is intended for students who want to embark on a career in finance or who plan to practice corporate law (mergers and acquisitions, capital markets, corporate transactions, and other related fields).

Note: This course will meet on a condensed schedule, dates TBD.