ABOUT US


ASA Commerce Group is an Oakville based corporate finance practice founded in early 1994.

ASA provides advisory services and negotiation assistance to small to mid-market sized companies involved in:

  • acquiring other businesses. We specialize in working with clients, including individuals, to target and contact businesses that are not actively for sale;
  • merging with other businesses;
  • obtaining patient capital - term debt, subordinated debt, mezzanine debt from institutional and alternative lending sources; and
  • obtaining working capital from sources other than the Canadian banks.

ASA usually advises on transactions in the $1 to $10 million range. Transactions on which ASA has advised during the past 5 years ranged from $300 thousand to over $20 million. Much of our activity is conducted for companies with sales from $3 to $40 million.


In some cases our clients do not require our assistance in locating acquisition targets or sources of capital. These clients are generally more interested in our ability to negotiate on their behalf to get a better result than they might reach by themselves or to structure the transaction to improve the likelihood of success.

WHO WE ACT FOR


Although we advise clients in a variety of industries, we usually assist owners of privately owned companies and individuals that have all or some of the following characteristics:

  • the ability to lead a company through planned and controlled growth or recovery or to lead an acquisition through ownership transition;
  • the principals demonstrate their commitment to the business;
  • the business exhibits an identifiable reason to exist (i.e., unique products or services; significant market share or the potential to capture significant market share; a market niche that provides growth potential and is defensible; products that have branded, proprietary or technological positioning).

Each year much of ASA's work is performed for continuing and previous clients. Many of the referrals of new business to ASA are provided by former clients, major financial institutions, venture capital groups, private equity groups and other corporate finance practices.

FEES


Fees are largely success oriented. Our success fee is based on a percentage of the transaction value. We charge monthly work fees while the project is in process. These work fees are credited against the success fee when a transaction is completed.