Due diligence in India, at deal speed
Sapiensu investigates a company, its promoters and the people around it across India's registries, courts, regulators and press, and returns findings you can take to an investment committee: each with its sources, a confidence level and what it means for the decision.
What due diligence has to answer
Before money changes hands, a buyer, investor or lender needs to know who they are dealing with, what could go wrong, and whether anything already on the record says so. Financial and legal diligence test the numbers and the contracts. Background diligence tests the people and the history: who really owns and controls the business, what litigation and regulatory action surrounds it, and whether its promoters have left problems behind elsewhere.
In India much of that answer sits in public records, but scattered: company filings with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, insolvency proceedings before the National Company Law Tribunal, cases across the High Courts and district courts, orders from sector regulators, and years of press coverage. The hard part is rarely finding one record. It is connecting them.
What a check covers
A due diligence check on an Indian company and its promoters looks at seven things.
- Identity and history
- Incorporation, changes of name and registered office, filings made and filings missed.
- Ownership and control
- Shareholders, beneficial owners, related entities and the directors who sit across them.
- Charges and debt
- Registered charges, who the lenders are, and signs of financial stress.
- Litigation and insolvency
- Civil, criminal and insolvency proceedings involving the company and the people behind it.
- Regulatory action
- Orders, penalties and directions from regulators.
- Sanctions and exposure
- Sanctions lists and links to politically exposed persons, for the entity and its people.
- Media and reputation
- What the press has reported, and whether the record bears it out.
How Sapiensu does it
Sapiensu produces intelligence, not information. Several agents work the registries, courts, regulators and press at once, so where a team can take weeks of hand-offs, Sapiensu returns findings in minutes and, at most, 2 hours.
No finding ships without three things: a confidence level, the sources it rests on with the category of each, and a note on what it means for this decision. Every step is recorded in an audit trail, so a reviewer can see how a conclusion was reached.
Diligence does not stop at signing. The investigation becomes the baseline that Surveillance watches after the deal, and the evidence Analysis draws on to ask what happens next.
Who it is for
- PE and VC firms
- Investment teams preparing a deal for committee, who need to know what could go wrong with a target and to keep watching it after the deal.
- M&A law firms
- Transaction, disputes and regulatory lawyers doing legal diligence on a counterparty: litigation, charges, regulatory action and beneficial ownership.
- Corporations and enterprises
- Corporate development, compliance, risk and procurement teams tracking targets and screening vendors and partners at volume.
Questions
How long does due diligence on an Indian company take?
Done by hand it often takes weeks, because the file passes from researcher to analyst to writer. Sapiensu's agents work in parallel and return findings in minutes and, at most, 2 hours, each one sourced so your team can check it.
How is this different from a data aggregator?
An aggregator gives you records. Sapiensu connects them, explains why something matters for the decision in front of you, and keeps building on the investigation instead of starting again next time.
Can I see Sapiensu in action?
Yes. Sapiensu is available to demo. Request one below and we will reach out to schedule it.