Lexcel's Mission to Automate M&A Diligence End to End

Lexcel’s Mission to Automate M&A Diligence End to End

We set out to automate M&A legal diligence from start to finish. From the moment a data room opens to the delivery of a polished diligence memo. This includes everything in between: diligence calls, request lists, constant data room updates, evolving deal terms, collaborative analysis across team members, and the synthesis of hundreds of findings into actionable intelligence.

This is an audacious goal. M&A diligence is extraordinarily complex, with countless moving parts and judgment calls at every stage. But we believe it is achievable. The technology has reached an inflection point, and we are building the platform to make end-to-end automation a reality.

Why This Is So Hard

M&A diligence is not a linear process. It demands multiple forms of analysis happening simultaneously, each dependent on information that changes throughout the transaction.

Understanding the Business and Assessing Contractual Risk

Understanding the business means more than reading contracts. It requires comprehending how a company operates, who runs it, what drives revenue, where operational dependencies lie.

Assessing contractual risk across the entire portfolio is equally critical: obligations that could create post-closing liability, change of control triggers that require consent or notice prior to closing.

Understanding How Deal Terms Shape Your Review

The negotiated deal terms shape your diligence analysis. If the seller represents that it does not have any acquisition contracts that create ongoing obligations over $20,000 a year, all responsive agreements must be identified to ensure they are properly listed in the disclosure schedules. This applies to every representation.

Identifying Gaps and Managing Constant Evolution

Identifying what is missing is essential. Data rooms start incomplete. Recognizing gaps requires understanding what should be there based on the business being analyzed.

Managing constant evolution is equally demanding. Data rooms change daily as request lists go out and new batches arrive. Deal documents get redlined through dozens of versions. Analysis that was accurate Monday becomes outdated Thursday.

The Economic Burden

This complexity creates massive economic burden. Large deals require 20 to 50 attorneys spending hundreds of hours each in sprawling data rooms. At $700 to $1,300 per hour, single deals generate $500,000 to over $2 million in diligence fees. Sixty to 70 percent of associate time goes to mechanical work: building trackers, extracting terms, organizing documents. Clients pay premium rates for data wrangling, not strategic analysis.

Most AI platforms stop at contract extraction. End-to-end automation requires solving all of these challenges simultaneously.

Why Now?

The answer is simple: foundational models are getting significantly better. Context windows have expanded dramatically, and models have become far more capable at agentic tasks; not just answering questions, but making correct tool calls, creating and manipulating data, and executing complex functions. This shift enables true workflow automation. Early AI legal tools relied on simple prompt chaining and chat interfaces. Now, AI can handle complex multi-step tasks that previously required manual attorney work.

Our Progress and Invitation

We are automating the fact-gathering and mechanical work of diligence while leaving judgment calls to attorneys.

We have already automated significant portions of the workflow. Smart Tables handle contract extraction at scale, eliminating manual tracker-building. Insight Boards generate comprehensive diligence intelligence that connects patterns across dozens of agreements. Lexcel Lighthouse monitors evolving data rooms and alerts teams when new information affects existing analysis.

Our collaboration features create the infrastructure for team-based automation. Editing, commenting, flagging, approving, and activity history turn the platform into a shared intelligence hub where everyone works from the same source-linked findings. The memo builds progressively, not in a last-minute scramble.

Each feature moves us closer to end-to-end automation. Each release tackles another piece of the workflow that previously required manual effort. We are constantly pushing the boundaries of what AI can do, releasing new features and improvements continuously.

Achieving this mission requires more than technology. It requires deep understanding of M&A workflows. Lexcel is built by M&A attorneys who are also AI engineers. We have lived the pain of manual diligence and built the platform we wish we had during our own deals.

This is a multi-year journey, but the technology has reached an inflection point. The team is committed. The need is urgent. The firms that embrace this transformation will move faster, deliver sharper analysis, and win more deals. Join us in building this future, whether as early adopters or as team members.