Use case
Preparing a seller-commissioned VDD report before launch
Download the CSV, open it in Excel or Google Sheets, customise the rows, then upload the finished index to Data Room Builder. The columns are intentionally simple: Level 1, Level 2, Level 3 and Notes.
| Level 1 | Level 2 | Level 3 | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01 VDD Workstream | 01.01 Scope and information request | — | Provider scope letter and master request list |
| 01 VDD Workstream | 01.02 Findings and issue log | — | Draft findings, management responses and remediation |
| 02 Financial | 02.01 Audited accounts and bridges | — | Three years plus EBITDA and net-debt bridges |
| 02 Financial | 02.02 Quality of earnings support | — | Normalisations, one-offs, pro-forma adjustments |
| 03 Legal | 03.01 Corporate structure and title | — | Group chart, statutory registers, share title chain |
| 03 Legal | 03.02 Material contracts | — | Customer, supplier and financing agreements |
| 04 Commercial | 04.01 Market and pipeline evidence | — | Market sizing, cohorts, pipeline conversion |
| 05 Tax | 05.01 Filings and positions | — | Returns, open enquiries, structuring memos |
| 06 Management | 06.01 Equity story support | — | Business plan, KPIs, management presentations |
Implementation tips
- Run the VDD room as the master copy — the buyer-facing room later inherits its numbering.
- Keep the issue log restricted to the deal team; findings leak negotiating leverage.
- Reconcile every VDD data point to a document in the room so the report footnotes resolve.
FAQs
What is the difference between VDD and sell-side preparation?
VDD is a seller-commissioned, provider-authored report buyers can rely on; sell-side prep organises the same evidence but produces no reliance report.
Should the VDD room be shown to buyers?
Usually a cleaned copy is: the findings log and drafts stay private while the supporting documents migrate into the buyer-facing room.