Standardization can be a virtue and one that M&A lawyers, likely due to self-interest and ego, sometimes resist.  If venture financing and derivatives practices can have widely accepted forms of legal documentation as a starting point, why should M&A be an exception?  Ironically, agreements for takeovers of publicly traded companies – once revered as a rarified realm that only an elite group huddled in skyscrapers in Manhattan could navigate – has evolved considerably toward standard forms thanks to enhanced attention to these publicly filed agreements and an effort by Delaware courts to draw clearer guidelines about precisely what will and will not fly in the world of “public M&A.” 
Continue Reading Guidance on Navigating the Atlassian Term Sheet: Understanding the Substantive Implications Behind the Virtues of Standardization in M&A