Questions to Ask When Assessing Virtual Data Rooms

A Virtual Data Room (VDR) is cloud-based, secure storage for sharing and storing data. They’re utilized for everything from M&A through capital raises, audits strategic reviews and tenders. The final results of any transaction depend on the reliability of these documents. These are the issues to ask when assessing the reliability of a VDR provider.

For many years attorneys, regulators, and banks exchanged files in physical rooms at set times. Today, these documents are digitally digitized and can be exchanged easily through the internet.

If you’re a PE/VC business that is juggling multiple deals at once or an corporate M&A dealmaker who wants to accelerate due diligence, the right VDR will benefit your business in a scalable manner. Choose VDRs that permit you to import files from storage platforms like Google Drive, Box or OneDrive. Also, those that integrate with your eSignature provider and allow you to sign contracts through the platform, rather than emailing drafts back and forward or using an e-Signature service from a third party.

The top modern VDR providers offer advanced document processing and search features making it possible to locate information quickly. This includes optical character recognition (OCR) and full text search, along with the capability to merge information from multiple documents into a PDF document. Many offer 24/7 multilingual chat and phone support.

The most important thing to look for is a pricing model based on the project. Instead of charging according to the number of ma data room people accessing a VDR over the course of the project, reliable providers will charge according to the number and size of storage utilized. This will stop costs from escalating out of control as the project develops.