LONDON & NEW YORK — Artificial intelligence and advanced technologies are fundamentally altering how global transactions are sourced, valued, and closed, turning technology into a primary acquisition rationale across every sector rather than a siloed asset class, according to a major new report from Eversheds Sutherland.
Titled “This is the new M&A: Technology and the new deal logic,” the global study reveals that rather than curbing transaction volumes or automating away legal oversight, the AI revolution is accelerating deal momentum while significantly escalating transaction complexity, valuation nuances, and cross-border regulatory exposure.
Across non-tech industries, acquiring digitally mature targets is increasingly viewed as an essential defensive hedge against market disruption. Consequently, buyers are recalibrating traditional multiples to place premium weight on proprietary data architectures, specialist engineering talent, code bases, and digital infrastructure.
The Rise of Bespoke Dealmaking
While AI-driven due diligence platforms and automated transaction workflows are cutting deal cycles and surfacing risks faster, they are also driving demand for highly tailored transaction documentation.
“Technology is lowering barriers to entry and making many aspects of M&A more efficient, but it is also making transactions more complex,” said Antony Walsh, Partner and International Head of Corporate at Eversheds Sutherland.
“AI enables deeper due diligence, more sophisticated analysis, and greater insight into risk. As a result, buyers are demanding more tailored deal terms, more robust protections, and more detailed assessments of value creation. Rather than reducing the need for legal expertise, these developments are increasing demand for specialist judgment. Technology can accelerate decisions, but understanding, allocating, and mitigating risk remains fundamentally a human exercise.”
Regulatory Scrutiny and Evolving Asset Classes
The report identifies three structural shifts driving the new deal environment:
- Shifting Core Assets: Acquirers are targeting intangible tech assets—data rights, intellectual property, infrastructure, and technical talent—requiring novel approaches to representation and warranty structures, IP indemnities, and valuation metrics.
- Granular Diligence & Execution: AI-assisted analytics allow buyers to interrogate target data at unprecedented scale, resulting in non-standard risk allocation clauses and heavily negotiated earnouts.
- Heightened Regulatory Exposure: Dealmakers face intensifying cross-border scrutiny around algorithmic governance, data sovereignty, cybersecurity resilience, and national security restrictions on critical technologies.
“Tech-related assets, including data, IP, technology, and talent, are the strategic drivers for more and more deals, regardless of industry,” noted Robert E. Copps, Partner, Co-Head of Global Corporate and Head of M&A (US). “Consequently, the legal issues around those assets are taking on greater importance, and the regulatory environment around many of those assets is simultaneously evolving. This is impacting deal diligence, structures, and valuations.”
Copps added that market winners will be the organizations capable of leveraging technological speed while maintaining rigorous commercial and regulatory risk management.
The full Eversheds Sutherland report, “This is the new M&A: Technology and the new deal logic,” is available via Eversheds Sutherland’s global corporate practice group.
