Exits and Disposals
Service overview: Exits and disposals solicitors
- As a specialist in start-ups and high growth businesses, a main focus for our firm is guiding businesses from formation through to successful exit.
- Whether you’re selling your business as a trade sale, a secondary buy-out, a partial exit, to realise either investment or a return on growth, as part of business evolution or due to retirement, planning a smooth business exit and disposal strategy is essential for a successful transition or sale.
- We regularly advise clients in relation to exit and disposal strategy planning, trade sales, family succession planning, management buy-outs (MBOs), mergers and acquisitions (M&A), private equity transactions, IPOs, and winding up.
- Our expert corporate solicitors can help negotiate sale and purchase agreements as well as structuring deals, overseeing transactions and advising on key documentation such as heads of terms, warranties and indemnities and confidentiality agreements.
- As a full-service law firm, our corporate exits and disposal lawyers tap into combined knowledge across our teams in M&A, banking and finance, tax, intellectual property and employment law.
What we do: Legal advice on disposals and exits
Strategy, timing, and process are all key to the success of a company exit or disposal. Harper James’ disposals and exits lawyers can provide the expert legal support and backing you need throughout the process.
Business exit and disposal requires a carefully considered and well-planned strategy to achieve the ultimate objectives of the key stakeholders. Whether you are at the start of your commercial journey, with intentions to build and/or acquire business entities from which you will exit in subsequent years, or if you are now ready to consider your exit route, we can assist you in determining the options which will best serve your interests.
Some of the key legal tasks we undertake for disposals include:
- Negotiating and drafting transactional documents such as sale and purchase agreements
- Deal structuring
- Drafting heads of terms and memoranda of understanding
- Negotiating and advising on warranties and indemnities, plus other provisions to protect vendors
- Advising on the value of your IP assets
- Drafting confidentiality agreements and NDAs
- Legal and financial due diligence
Who we help: Start-ups, SMEs, entrepreneurs, investors and funders
Our exit and disposals lawyers have worked with many entrepreneurs and small, medium, and large businesses to review their plans for disposal and exit. They have the skills to filter out the noise and to focus in on the commercial imperatives that make the difference in your transaction.
We can advise and represent companies and individual shareholders in relation to:
- Exit and disposal strategy planning
- Family succession
- IPOs
- Management buy-outs (MBOs)
- Mergers and acquisitions (M&A)
- Private equity transactions
- Winding up
- Trade sales
Our clients often benefit from business, financial, and legal insights that they had not previously considered; all of which can be key to the successful outcome of their venture. Harper James is a full-service law firm, which means our corporate clients seeking to review or implement their plans for business divestment benefit from legal expertise in a range of inter-related areas, including company mergers and acquisitions, private equity, restructuring, taxation, banking and finance, IP, disputes, employment law, and technology solicitors. This enables our team of disposal and exit lawyers to provide strategic holistic guidance on a complete end-to-end commercial strategy, looking outside the business transaction at hand to ensure your best interests are fully protected.
Don’t forget to explore the Corporate law area in our advice centre for lots of useful information on sales and acquisitions, limiting liability, due diligence and more.
Why choose Harper James? Our disposals experience
Harper James is a modern law firm with a difference. Our innovative remote operating model mean you can access expert City-grade legal advice from partner-level solicitors at a fraction of the cost of traditional law firms. Our solicitors have all been recruited from top too UK law firms or large international businesses. Find out more about our exits and disposals lawyers here:
Examples of our work
Pricing plans
Our three transparent pricing packages are designed to give you the widest possible access to high-quality legal advice, whatever the size and nature of your business:
City
Straightforward access to senior solicitors at a competitive rate.
An affordable solution for businesses needing one-off legal support. Receive ‘City’ partner-level expertise at a fraction of ‘City’ prices.
Enterprise
Have legal peace of mind for £189 per month with additional support from £99 per hour.
A monthly subscription legal support package specifically designed for start-ups and smaller businesses.
On-Demand
For businesses requiring 60+ hours of support a year, with prices equivalent to £99 per hour.
Fully account managed quarterly subscription service for businesses with more complex legal needs.
What our clients say
We pride ourselves on delivering an excellent service for clients, but don’t just take our word for it.
We rely on Harper James to provide us with support across a full range of service areas, from commercial contracts and employment issues to fundraisings and investments. The team at Harper James are always available to provide us with cost effective, pragmatic and commercially focused advice.

Harper James provide a cost effective, responsive and versatile service and provide us with access to legal teams that are experienced, commercially focused and well-resourced. Most importantly they are extremely familiar with the SME market and know the venture capital sector well.
