Morrison Foerster, Ernst & Young and Washington Technology held its 8th Annual Federal M&A Outlook on October 25, 2012 at the Ritz Carlton in Tysons Corner.
The morning event included executives from the financing, banking and government contracting sectors.
Edward S. Caso, Managing Director and Senior Analyist, IT/BPO Services Equity Research Team of Wells Fargo Securities, Keynoted the three hour event before the Investment Banking Panel at 8:30am and the CEO/Buy-Side Panel at 9:00am.
Investment Banking panelists included:
Don Blair, Managing Director of Raymond James & Associates
Bob Kipps, Managing Partner of Kipps DeSanto
Jeff McGrath, Managing Director of Wells Fargo Securities
Chris Oliver, Managing Director of Sagent Advisors
Jean Stack, Managing Director of Houlian and Lokey
CEO/Buy-Side panelists included:
Brad Antle, President and CEO of Salient Federal Solutions
Walter Batson, CEO of Camber Corporation
Bob Coleman, CEO of Six3 Systems, Inc.
Michael Lustbader, Partner of Arlington Capital Partners
Larry Yanowitch, Co-Chair of Global Mergers & Acquisitions Group of Morrison & Foerster, LLP, and Paul Feeko, Partner of Transaction advisory Services at Ernst & Young, were moderators for the program.
Larry Yanowitch told WashingtonExec, “The consensus from our M&A Outlook Conference was that M&A in the sector will continue to evolve in 2013. The public companies will continue to realign their portfolios by spinning off or divesting slower growth businesses and acquiring higher growth businesses and businesses that create diversification opportunities.”
Bob Kipps also spoke with WashingtonExec, saying, “The 300 CEOs and industry insiders that attended MOFO’s 8th annual 2013 GovCon M&A “Summit” likely weren’t surprised to hear that while the M&A drum continues to beat, it sure sounds better for the top tier firms oriented towards Cybersecurity, Intelligence, Big Data, C4ISR and Health IT. Choppy procurement activity, LPTA, Sequestration fears and increased government compliance/oversight have wreaked havoc on sellers’ revenue visibility, intensified buyer due diligence, elongated deal timetables and often hampered deal terms for most firms.”
Over 300 executives attended the sold-out event.
