In Conversation with Anu Aiyengar, Global Co-Head of M&A, JPMorgan Chase

SS&C Intralinks’ product offerings, thought leadership and brand often result in opportunities to participate in media events. These occasions are important because they allow us to engage our global community and share valuable market intelligence. That was why we were pleased to sponsor the inaugural Bloomberg Deals Summit — you can read a full recap of the virtual event here — where I had the privilege of participating in a conversation with Anu Aiyengar, JPMorgan Chase’s global co-head of M&A.

Anu has advised both domestic and international clients on nearly USD 1 trillion dollars’ worth of transactions, including mergers, acquisitions, divestitures and leveraged buyouts. She is also involved with several initiatives across JPMorgan Chase and Wall Street to recruit, mentor and develop women.

With M&A activity surging this year in the wake of a brief pause in dealmaking when the global health crisis took hold in Q1 2020, it was interesting to hear Anu’s insight into contributing factors, how JPMorgan’s clients are handling virtual due diligence, the hot topic of SPACs and what M&A looks like for the remainder of the year.

A seasoned dealmaker, Anu said that the pandemic removed the physical interactions that are part of the deal process. “You thought about M&A as something where you have to physically be in the room and look into the whites of people’s eyes; now we’ve done M&A deals from start to finish remotely,” she said. “It does take more effort because chemistry building does become harder over a remote platform, but technology has really been amazing." 

Anu added, “My takeaway from all this is to never underestimate human creativity because when you find yourself in a position where all the traditional tools of M&A are not available to you, you find another way to do it.”

I appreciate Anu’s insight and time, and I hope you will watch a replay of our conversation and the many other featured discussions on M&A dealmaking in 2021.