Firmex Virtual Data Room vs. SS&C Intralinks DealCentre

Great for transactions involving file sharing where large amounts of documents need to be shared between multiple parties at different organizations. I could also see its utility as a document management site for an entity going through a reorganization or transition. It is not appropriate as a permanent document management system.

Incentivized

Intralinks is well suited if the user wants to do essential file management on the cloud.

Incentivized

• Status updates
• Visual display
• Organization capabilities

Incentivized

• Workspace creation
• Security at granular level

Incentivized

• This is a bit of a stretch, because as far as I know, no data room provides this, but I think it would be interesting if they added a feature to manage supplemental due diligence requests. In almost every transaction I've been involved with, the buyer has supplemental due diligence requests, either because the seller did not want to provide a document or because they did not think it was sufficiently material (or they just forgot!). These supplemental requests get handled separately, using a Word or Excel document, but I think it would be nice if it could be handled directly in the data room. The reason this would be handy is that you could include dynamics links in the questions (Page 2 is missing from Document 1.1.2 - and then there is a link right to Document 1.1.2) and in the answers (See Document 3.3.4 for the missing financial statements - and then there is a link right to the missing document).
• This is partly on the users, but I do not like it when a data room allows you to delete a document without there being an ongoing reference to the deleted document. It makes it hard for the other side (the purchaser) to keep straight the numbering of the due diligence documents. At a minimum, the software should just keep the numbering of the documents the same with an "Intentionally Deleted" next to the deleted document.

Incentivized

• Drag/Drop of documents directly from emails (this seems to be common among data room type software)

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Maintenance is a bit slow.

Incentivized

I think Firmex stacks up well with Merrill DatasiteOne, and I do not really have a preference between the two. Likewise, there are other data room services out there, and the good ones generally work pretty much the same, and I do not really have a favorite (this coming from someone who has a favorite on most things). Firmex does work much better for complex transactions than Dropbox Business, OneDrive and other cloud base file-sharing services because those services are designed for (1) more general uses, and (2) collaborating across organizations. Firmex is better for due diligence on corporate transactions because of things like the ability to print a complete data room index of 1000s of documents (this makes it easier to tell individuals in the organization who has to review what documents) and strong protections on what people who download documents can do with them (ie: watermarks, locked PDFs so they cannot manipulate the documents). Firmex is optimized for due diligence review, rather than collaboration.

Incentivized

Intralinks is more robust and has a more professional user interface. I use both products but I would default to intralinks if it was an important project involving outside resources or partners. Box I feel is perfectly suitable for internal projects that involve department members or multiple company departments

Incentivized

• Positive impact on conducting due diligence efficiently.
• Positive impact on being responsive to fast-moving transactions because of the e-mail updates when new documents get uploaded.

Incentivized

• Has made us more efficient
• Has aided in project management
• Has aided in collaboration

Incentivized