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Unless otherwise stated in this Annual Report on Form 10-K (this “Report”), or the context otherwise requires, references to:
“common stock” are to our Class A common stock and our Class B common stock, collectively;
“founder shares” are to shares of our Class B common stock initially purchased by our sponsor in a private placement prior to the offering, and the shares of our Class A common stock issued upon the conversion thereof;
“initial public offering” are to our initial public offering consummated on November 1, 2021.
“initial stockholders” are to holders of our founder shares prior to our offering;
“management” or our “management team” are to our officers and directors, and “directors” are to our current directors;
“private placement warrants” are to the warrants issued to our sponsor in a private placement simultaneously with the closing of the offering;
“public shares” are to shares of our Class A common stock sold as part of the units in the offering (whether they are purchased in our initial public offering or thereafter in the open market);
“public stockholders” are to the holders of our public shares, including our initial stockholders and management team to the extent our initial stockholders and/or members of our management team purchase public shares, provided that each initial stockholder’s and member of our management team’s status as a “public stockholder” shall only exist with respect to such public shares;
“sponsor” are to Focus Impact Sponsor, LLC, a Delaware limited liability company;
“trust account” are to the trust account established in connection with our initial public offering;
“underwriters” are to Citigroup Global Markets Inc., Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC, CastleOak Securities, L.P. and Siebert Williams Shank & Co., LLC; and
“we,” “us,” “our,” “company,” “FIAC,” the “Company” or “our companyCompany” are to Focus Impact Acquisition Corp.
CAUTIONARY NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS
This Report, including, without limitation, statements under the heading “Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations,” includes forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, (the “Securities Act”“Securities Act”) and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, (the “Exchange Act”“Exchange Act”). These forward-looking statements can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology, including the words “believes,” “estimates,” “anticipates,” “expects,” “intends,” “plans,” “may,” “will,” “potential,” “projects,” “predicts,” “continue,” or “should,” or, in each case, their negative or other variations or comparable terminology. There can be no assurance that actual results will not materially differ from expectations. Such statements include, but are not limited to, any statements relating to our ability to consummate any acquisitionour proposed business combination with DevvStream (as defined below) or other business combination and any other statements that are not statements of current or historical facts. These statements are based on management’s current expectations, but actual results may differ materially due to various factors, including, but not limited to:
our ability to select an appropriate target business or businesses;
our ability to complete any initialour proposed business combination;with DevvStream;
our expectations around the performance of theDevvStream or any other prospective target business or businesses;
our success in retaining or recruiting, or changes required in, our officers, key employees or directors following our initial business combination;
our officers and directors allocating their time to other businesses and potentially having conflicts of interest with our business or in approving our initial business combination, as a result of which they would then receive expense reimbursements;
our potential ability to obtain additional financing to complete our initial business combination;
our pool of prospective target businesses;
our ability to consummate an initial business combination due to the uncertainty resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic;
the ability of our officers and directors to generate a number of potential acquisition opportunities;
our public securities’ potential liquidity and trading;
the lack of a market for our securities;
the use of proceeds not held in the trust account or available to us from interest income on the trust account balance;
the trust account not being subject to claims of third parties; or
our financial performance following theour initial public offering.
The forward-looking statements contained in this Report are based on our current expectations and beliefs concerning future developments and their potential effects on us. There can be no assurance that future developments affecting us will be those that we have anticipated. These forward-looking statements involve a number of risks, uncertainties (some of which are beyond our control) or other assumptions that may cause actual results or performance to be materially different from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, those factors described under “Risk Factors.” Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should any of our assumptions prove incorrect, actual results may vary in material respects from those projected in these forward-looking statements. We undertake no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as may be required under applicable securities laws.
By their nature, forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties because they relate to events and depend on circumstances that may or may not occur in the future. We caution you that forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and that our actual results of operations, financial condition and liquidity, and developments in the industry in which we operate may differ materially from those made in or suggested by the forward-looking statements contained in this Report. In addition, even if our results or operations, financial condition and liquidity, and developments in the industry in which we operate are consistent with the forward-looking statements contained in this Report, those results or developments may not be indicative of results or developments in subsequent periods.
SUMMARY OF RISK FACTORS
We are a newly formed company that has conducted no operations and has generated no revenues. Until we complete our initial business combination, we will have no operations and will generate no operating revenues. In making your decision whether to invest in our securities, you should take into account not only the background of our management team, but also the special risks we face as a blank check company. Our initial public offering was not conducted in compliance with Rule 419 promulgated under the Securities Act. Accordingly, you will not be entitled to protections normally afforded to investors in Rule 419 blank check offerings. For additional information concerning how Rule 419 blank check offerings differ from our initial public offering, please see the section of this Report entitled “Business —- Comparison of Our Initial Public Offering to Those of Blank Check Companies Subject to Rule 419.” You should carefully consider these and the other risks set forth in the section of this Report entitled “Risk Factors.”
PART I
Overview
We are a blank check company with a mission to amplify social impact by investing in a high-growth company that is meaningfully aligned with one or more of four UN SDGs: Three (Good Health and Well-being); Four (Quality Education); Eight (Decent Work and Economic Growth); and Ten (Reduced Inequality). We define such businesses as “Social-Forward Companies,” and we believe meaningful alignment can be achieved through, among other things, a company’s business model, leadership, investment in its employees and commitment to its community. Through our focus, we hope to increase public market access for Social-Forward Companies and emphasize their potential competitive advantages in today’s markets and going forward.
In pursuit of this mission, Focus Impact Acquisition Corporation was formed as a Delaware corporation with a dual purpose: first, to effect a merger, capital stock exchange, asset acquisition, stock purchase, reorganization or similar transaction with one or more businesses (the “initial business combination”); and second, to encourage the development, deployment and amplification of financially and socially value-accretive operating practices and policies in the post-combination business.
We believe executing this dual purpose will simultaneously enhance our target business’ competitiveness while also advancing social impact. We find support both in credible research and in our management team’s professional experience for a connection between a business’s social commitments and competitive advantages. A National Bureau of Economic Research study found that employment opportunities that are social responsibility-oriented attract 25% more applicants, and those who they attract are more productive and produce higher quality work. Another study by a marketing agency found that 79% of Americans surveyed say they are more loyal as customers to purpose-driven brands than traditional brands. There is additional evidence that diversity of leadership correlates positively with financial performance and innovation; firms that invest in employee development have less churn and outperform; and a robust ESG framework mitigates risks. We believe we have seen evidence of such connections and more in our own leadership experience.
We also believe there are a large number of potential Social-Forward Companies. To narrow our search, we plan to focus on high-growth businesses in the education technology (EdTech), technology-enabled manufacturing and services, financial technology (FinTech) and healthcare technology (Health Tech) sectors, as well as on compelling companies in these or other sectors led by, founded by or serving BIPOC or women. As we discuss in more detail below, our four target sectors had an estimated combined global market size, measured by revenues, of approximately $688 billion in 2020,at the time of our initial public offering, and the universe of BIPOC- and women-led or focused businesses expands our target pool further. Within this universe, we will identify companies well-positioned to generate financial and social value when provided access to public markets, support from our leadership and our strategic partners and networks.
We believe that many companies in our four target sectors are either providing or capable of providing greater access for disadvantaged populations to essential services and opportunities in education, health and professional development. Further, we believe that BIPOC and women-led or focused businesses have been disadvantaged in terms of access to capital and therefore undervalued by markets. We believe elevating talented BIPOC and women executives into the public markets would contribute to reducing inequality by further improving the visibility of under-represented leaders. We believe that responsibly delivering capital to these sectors—andsectors-and to BIPOC and women leaders—canleaders-can be socially beneficial in and of itself.
Our team has particular expertise in our four target sectors, which we believe will position us to be a like-minded, operationally and financially sophisticated partner for the Social-Forward Companies that we target and provide us with an advantage in the market for such businesses. Additionally, we believe that our network and affiliation with Auldbrass Partners, an investment management fund and investor in our sponsor, will enhance our ability to source and execute an attractive initial business combination and provide us with differentiated access to pre-IPO businesses, particularly within our target industries.
While we may pursue an initial business combination in any industry or geographic location, we intend to focus our search in the United States. We have not selected any business combination target and we have not, nor has anyone on our behalf, initiated any substantive discussions, directly or indirectly, with any business combination target. Our target business does not need to already be a leader relative to its peers in terms of social forward-best practices. We intend to work with the target to unlock the value of its social investments in its business model, leadership, employees or commitment to its community.
Proposed Business Combination
On September 12, 2023, we entered into a Business Combination Agreement (as may be amended, supplemented or otherwise modified from time to time, the “Business Combination Agreement” and the transactions contemplated thereby, collectively, the “Business Combination”), by and among FIAC, Focus Impact Amalco Sub Ltd., a company existing under the laws of the Province of British Columbia (“Amalco Sub”) and DevvStream Holdings Inc., a company existing under the Laws of the Province of British Columbia (“DevvStream”). Pursuant to the Business Combination Agreement, among other things FIAC will acquire DevvStream for consideration of shares in FIAC following its continuance to the Province of Alberta (as further explained below). The terms of the Business Combination Agreement, which contains customary representations and warranties, covenants, closing conditions and other terms relating to the mergers and the other transactions contemplated thereby, are summarized below.
Structure of the Business Combination
The acquisition is structured as a continuance followed by an amalgamation transaction, resulting in the following:
| 1. | prior to the effective time of the Amalgamation (as defined below) (the “Effective Time”), FIAC will continue (the “FIAC Continuance”) from the State of Delaware under the Delaware General Corporation Law (“DGCL”) to the Province of Alberta under the Business Corporations Act (Alberta) (“ABCA”) and change its name to DevvStream Corp. (“New PubCo”). |
| 2. | following the FIAC Continuance, and in accordance with the applicable provisions of the Plan of Arrangement and the Business Corporations Act (British Columbia) (the “BCBCA”), Amalco Sub and DevvStream will amalgamate to form one corporate entity (“Amalco”) in accordance with the terms of the BCBCA (the “Amalgamation”), and as a result of the Amalgamation, (i) each multiple voting share of DevvStream, without par value (the “Multiple Voting Company Shares”) and each subordinate voting share of DevvStream, without par value (the “Subordinated Voting Company Shares” and together with the Multiple Voting Company Shares, the “Company Shares”) issued and outstanding immediately prior to the Effective Time will be automatically exchanged for that certain number of common shares of New PubCo (“New PubCo Common Shares”) equal to the applicable Per Common Share Amalgamation Consideration (as defined below), (ii) each option to purchase Company Shares (each a “Company Option”) and each restricted stock unit representing the right to receive payment in Company Shares (a “Company RSU”) issued and outstanding immediately prior to the Effective Time will be cancelled and converted into an option to purchase a number of New PubCo Common Shares (“Converted Options”) and New PubCo restricted stock units, representing the right to receive a number of New PubCo Common Shares (“Converted RSUs”), respectively, in an amount equal to the Company Shares underlying such Company Option or Company RSU, respectively, multiplied by the Common Conversion Ratio (as defined below, and, for Company Options, at an adjusted exercise price equal to the exercise price for such Company Option prior to the Effective Time divided by the Common Conversion Ratio), (iii) each warrant exercisable for Company Shares (a “Company Warrant”) issued and outstanding immediately prior to the Effective Time shall become exercisable for New PubCo Common Shares in an amount equal to the Company Shares underlying such Company Warrant multiplied by the Common Conversion Ratio (and at an adjusted exercise price equal to the exercise price for such Company Warrant prior to the Effective Time divided by the Common Conversion Ratio), (iv) each holder of convertible notes to be issued by DevvStream (the “Company Convertible Notes”), if any, issued and outstanding immediately prior to the Effective Time will first receive Company Shares and then New PubCo Common Shares in accordance with the terms of such Company Convertible Notes and (v) each common share of Amalco Sub issued and outstanding immediately prior to the Effective Time will be automatically exchanged for one common share of Amalco (the FIAC Continuance and the Amalgamation, together with the other transactions related thereto, the “Proposed Transactions”). |
The “Per Common Share Amalgamation Consideration” means (i) with respect to each Multiple Voting Company Share, an amount of New PubCo Common Shares equal to (a) ten (10), multiplied by (b) the Common Conversion Ratio, and (ii) with respect to the Subordinated Voting Company Share, an amount of New PubCo Common Shares equal to the Common Conversion Ratio. The “Common Conversion Ratio” means, in respect of a common share of DevvStream, the number equal to the Common Amalgamation Consideration divided by the Fully Diluted Common Shares Outstanding. The “Common Amalgamation Consideration” means (a)(i) $145 million plus (ii) the aggregate exercise price of all in-the-money Company Options and Company Warrants outstanding immediately prior to the Effective Time (or exercised in cash prior to the Effective Time) divided by (b) $10.20. The “Fully Diluted Common Shares Outstanding” means, without duplication, at any measurement time (a)(i) ten (10), multiplied by (ii) the aggregate number of Multiple Voting Company Shares that are issued and outstanding, plus (b) the aggregate number of Subordinated Voting Company Shares that are issued and outstanding, plus (c) the aggregate number of Subordinated Voting Company Shares to be issued pursuant to the exercise and conversion of the Company Options in accordance therewith, plus (d) the aggregate number of Subordinated Voting Company Shares to be issued pursuant to the exercise and conversion of the Company Warrants in accordance therewith, plus (e) the aggregate number of Subordinated Voting Company Shares to be issued pursuant to the vesting of the Company RSUs in accordance therewith.
| 3. | Simultaneously with the execution of the Business Combination Agreement, FIAC and the sponsor entered into a Sponsor Side Letter (as defined below), pursuant to which, among other things, the sponsor agreed to forfeit (i) 10% of its founder shares effective as of the consummation of the FIAC Continuance at the closing of the Proposed Transactions and (ii) with the sponsor’s consent, up to 30% of its founder shares and/or private placement warrants in connection with financing or non-redemption arrangements, if any, entered into prior to consummation of the Business Combination. Pursuant to the Sponsor Side Letter, the sponsor also agreed to (1) certain transfer restrictions with respect to our securities, lock-up restrictions (terminating upon the earlier of: (A) 360 days after the closing date of the Business Combination (the “Closing Date”), (B) a liquidation, merger, capital stock exchange, reorganization or other similar transaction that results in all of New PubCo’s stockholders having the right to exchange their equity for cash, securities or other property or (C) subsequent to the Closing Date, the closing price of the New Pubco Common Shares equaling or exceeding $12.00 per share (as adjusted for stock splits, stock dividends, reorganizations, recapitalizations and the like) for any 20 trading days within a 30-trading day period commencing at least 150 days after the closing of the Business Combination (the “Closing”)) and (2) to vote any FIAC shares held by it in favor of the Business Combination Agreement, the arrangement resolution and the Proposed Transactions, and provided customary representations and warranties and covenants related to the foregoing. |
| 4. | In addition, contemporaneously with the execution of the Business Combination Agreement, DevvStream, FIAC and each of Devvio, Inc., the majority and controlling shareholder of DevvStream, and DevvStream’s directors and officers (the “Core Company Securityholders”) entered into Company Support & Lock-Up Agreements (the “Company Support Agreements”), pursuant to which, among other things, (i) each of the Core Company Securityholders agreed to vote any Company Shares held by him, her or it in favor of the Business Combination Agreement, the arrangement resolution and the Proposed Transactions, and provided customary representations and warranties and covenants related to the foregoing, and (ii) each of the Core Company Securityholders has agreed to certain transfer restrictions with respect to DevvStream securities prior to the Effective Time and lock-up restrictions with respect to the New PubCo Common Shares to be received by such Core Company Securityholder under the Business Combination Agreement, which lock-up restrictions are consistent with those agreed to by the sponsor in the Sponsor Side Letter. |
The aggregate consideration to be paid to DevvStream shareholders and securityholders is that number of New PubCo Common Shares (or, with respect to Company Options, Company RSUs and Company Warrants, a number of Converted Options, Converted RSUs and Converted Warrants consistent with the aforementioned conversion mechanics) equal to (a) (i) $145 million plus (ii) the aggregate exercise price of all in-the-money options and warrants immediately prior to the Effective Time (or exercised in cash prior to the Effective Time) divided by (b) $10.20 (the “Share Consideration”). The Share Consideration is allocated among DevvStream shareholders and securityholders as set forth in the Business Combination Agreement.
The Closing will be on a date no later than two business days following the satisfaction or waiver of all of the closing conditions. It is expected that the Closing will occur on or before June 12, 2024.
Representations, Warranties and Covenants
The Business Combination Agreement contains customary representations, warranties and covenants of (a) DevvStream and (b) FIAC and Amalco Sub relating to, among other things, their ability and authority to enter into the Business Combination Agreement and their capitalization and operations.
The obligation of the parties to consummate the Proposed Transactions is conditioned on, among other things, the satisfaction or waiver (where permissible) by FIAC and DevvStream of the following conditions: (a) the stockholders of FIAC have approved and adopted the SPAC Shareholder Approval Matters (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement); (b) the shareholders of DevvStream have approved and adopted the Company Shareholder Approval Matters (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement); (c) absence of a law that makes the Proposed Transactions illegal or otherwise prohibits or enjoins the parties from consummating the same; (d) the registration statement has been declared effective by the SEC; (e) the New PubCo Common Shares have been approved for listing on Nasdaq; (f) shareholders of DevvStream have approved and adopted the arrangement resolution in accordance with the Interim Order; (g) the Interim Order and the Final Order (as such terms are defined in the Business Combination Agreement) have been obtained on terms consistent with the Business Combination Agreement and (h) the FIAC Continuance has been consummated.
FIAC and Amalco Sub Conditions to Closing
The obligations of FIAC, and Amalco Sub to consummate the Proposed Transactions are subject to the satisfaction or waiver by FIAC (where permissible) of the following additional conditions:
| • | The (i) Company Specified Representations (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement) are true and correct (without giving any effect to any limitation as to “materiality” or “Material Adverse Effect” or any similar limitation set forth therein) in all material respects as of the date of the Business Combination Agreement and on and as of the Closing Date immediately prior to the Effective Time as if made on the Closing Date immediately prior to the Effective Time (except to the extent such representations and warranties expressly relate to an earlier date, and in such case, shall be true and correct in all material respects on and as of such earlier date), (ii) representations and warranties set forth in Article V (other than Section 5.5), are true and correct (without giving any effect to any limitation as to “materiality” or “Material Adverse Effect” or any similar limitation set forth therein) as of the date of the Business Combination Agreement and on and as of the Closing Date immediately prior to the Effective Time as if made on the Closing Date immediately prior to the Effective Time (except to the extent such representations and warranties expressly relate to an earlier date, and in such case, shall be true and correct on and as of such earlier date), except, in each case, the failure of such representations and warranties to be so true and correct, has not had a Company Material Adverse Effect (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement) and (iii) the representations and warranties of DevvStream contained in Section 5.5 shall be true and correct, except for any de minimis failures to be so true and correct, as of the date of the Business Combination Agreement and on and as of the Closing Date as if made on the Closing Date (except to the extent such representations and warranties expressly relate to an earlier date, and in such case, shall be true and correct, except for any de minimis failures to be so true and correct, on and as of such earlier date) (collectively, the “DevvStream Representation Condition”). |
| • | DevvStream shall have performed or complied in all material respects with all agreements and covenants required by the Business Combination Agreement to be performed or complied with by it on or prior to the Closing Date (the “DevvStream Covenant Condition”). |
| • | There has been no event that is continuing that would, individually or in the aggregate, reasonably be expected to have a Company Material Adverse Effect (the “DevvStream MAE Condition”). |
Each of the Key Employees (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement) shall be actively employed or engaged with DevvStream as of the Closing Date.
DevvStream shall have delivered to FIAC a certificate, dated the Closing Date, signed by an executive officer of DevvStream, certifying as to the satisfaction of the DevvStream Representation Condition, the DevvStream Covenant Condition and the DevvStream MAE Condition (as it relates to DevvStream).
DevvStream shall have delivered a certificate, signed by the secretary of DevvStream, certifying that true, complete and correct copies of its organizational documents, as in effect on the Closing Date, and the resolutions of DevvStream’s board of directors authorizing and approving the Proposed Transactions are attached to such certificate.
DevvStream shall have delivered counterparts of the Registration Rights Agreement (as defined below) executed by each holder of shares, options or warrants of Devvstream.
The Core Company Securityholders shall be party to a Company Support Agreement.
DevvStream shall have delivered executed counterparts of all Key Employment Agreements (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement).
DevvStream shall have delivered a properly executed certification, dated as of the Closing Date, that meets the requirements of U.S. Treasury Regulations Sections 1.897-2(h) and 1.1445-2(c)(3), certifying that DevvStream is not and has not been a “United States real property holding corporation” (as defined in Section 897(c)(2) of the Code).
Devvstream Conditions to Closing
The obligations of DevvStream to consummate the Proposed Transactions are subject to the satisfaction or waiver (where permissible) of the following additional conditions:
| • | The (i) SPAC Specified Representations (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement) are true and correct (without giving any effect to any limitation as to “materiality” or “Material Adverse Effect” or any similar limitation set forth therein) in all material respects as of the date of the Business Combination Agreement and on and as of the Closing Date as if made on the Closing Date (except to the extent such representations and warranties expressly relate to an earlier date, and in such case, shall be true and correct in all material respects on and as of such earlier date), (ii) representations and warranties set forth in Articles III and IV (other than the SPAC Specified Representations and those contained in Section 3.5 and Section 4.5 of the Business Combination Agreement), without giving effect to materiality, Material Adverse Effect or similar qualifications, are true and correct in all respects at and as of the Closing Date as though such representations and warranties were made at and as of the Closing Date (other than in the case of any representation or warranty that by its terms addresses matters only as of another specified date, which will be so true and correct only as of such specified date), except to the extent the failure of such representations and warranties to be true and correct would not reasonably be expected to have, individually or in the aggregate, a SPAC Material Adverse Effect (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement) and (iii) the representations and warranties of FIAC and Amalco Sub, respectively, contained in Section 3.5 and Section 4.5 shall be true and correct, except for any de minimis failures to be so true and correct, as of the date of the Business Combination Agreement and on and as of the Closing Date as if made on the Closing Date (except to the extent such representations and warranties expressly relate to an earlier date, and in such case, shall be true and correct, except for any de minimis failures to be so true and correct, on and as of such earlier date) (the “FIAC Representation Condition”). |
| • | Each of FIAC and Amalco Sub, respectively, shall have performed or complied in all material respects with all agreements and covenants required by the Business Combination Agreement to be performed or complied with by it on or prior to the Closing Date (the “FIAC Covenant Condition”). |
FIAC shall have delivered to DevvStream a certificate, dated the Closing Date, signed by an authorized officer of FIAC, certifying as to the satisfaction of the FIAC Representation Condition and the FIAC Covenant Condition.
FIAC shall have delivered to DevvStream, dated the Closing Date, signed by the Secretary of FIAC certifying certifying that true, complete and correct copies of its organizational documents (after giving effect to the FIAC Continuance), as in effect on the Closing Date, and as to the resolutions of FIAC’s board of directors unanimously authorizing and approving the Proposed Transactions and respective stockholders or members, as applicable, authorizing and approving the Proposed Transactions.
DevvStream shall have received counterparts of the Registration Rights Agreement executed by New PubCo.
FIAC and New PubCo shall have delivered to DevvStream resignations of certain directors and executive officers of FIAC and Amalco Sub.
The Business Combination Agreement may be terminated at any time by DevvStream and FIAC with mutual written consent and by DevvStream or FIAC, respectively, as follows:
| (i)
| By FIAC or DevvStream, if (i) the Required Company Shareholder Approval (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement) is not obtained at Company Meeting (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement), (ii) if the required approvals are not obtained at the SPAC Special Meeting (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement), (iii) a law or orders prohibits or enjoins the consummation of the arrangement and has become final and nonappealable, or (iv) the Effective Time does not occur on or before June 12, 2024 subject to a one-time thirty (30)-day extension upon written agreement of the parties (provided, that, if the registration statement shall not have been declared effective by the SEC as of the Outside Date, the FIAC shall be entitled to one sixty (60)-day extension upon notice to DevvStream) (the “Outside Date”) (provided, however, that the right to terminate the Business Combination Agreement under the clause described in this clause will not be available to a party if the inability to satisfy such conditions was due to the failure of such party to perform any of its obligations under the Business Combination Agreement). |
| (ii) | By FIAC or DevvStream if DevvStream’s board of directors or any committee thereof has withdrawn or modified, or publicly proposed or resolved to withdraw, the recommendation that DevvStream shareholders vote in favor of DevvStream shareholder approval or DevvStream enters into a Superior Proposal (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement). |
| (iii) | By DevvStream upon written notice to FIAC, in the event of a breach of any representation, warranty, covenant or agreement on the part of FIAC or Amalco Sub, such that the FIAC Representation Condition or FIAC Covenant Condition would not be satisfied at the Closing, and which, (i) with respect to any such breach that is capable of being cured, is not cured by FIAC within 30 business days after receipt of written notice thereof, or (ii) is incapable of being cured prior to the Outside Date; provided, that DevvStream will not have the right to terminate if it is then in material breach of the Business Combination Agreement. |
| (iv) | By FIAC upon written notice to DevvStream, in the event of a breach of any representation, warranty, covenant or agreement on the part of DevvStream, such that DevvStream Representation Condition or DevvStream Covenant Condition would not be satisfied at the Closing, and which, (i) with respect to any such breach that is capable of being cured, is not cured by DevvStream within 30 business days after receipt of written notice thereof, or (ii) is incapable of being cured prior to the Outside Date; provided, that FIAC will not have the right to terminate the Business Combination Agreement if it is then in material uncured breach of the Business Combination Agreement. |
| (v) | By FIAC upon written notice to DevvStream if there has been a Company Material Adverse Effect which is not cured by DevvStream within 30 business days after receipt of written notice thereof. |
The Business Combination Agreement provides for the following with respect to expenses related to the Proposed Transactions:
| • | If the Proposed Transactions are consummated, New PubCo will bear expenses of the parties, including the SPAC Specified Expenses (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement), all deferred expenses, including any legal fees of the FIAC initial public offering due upon consummation of a Business Combination and any Excise Tax Liability (as defined below). The Excise Tax Liability was incurred in connection with two meetings of the stockholders of FIAC to extend the date upon which a business combination could occur, where upon holders of an aggregate of 21,282,422 public shares of FIAC properly exercised their right to redeem their shares. This resulted in an excise tax liability in the amount of $2,235,006 as of December 31, 2023 (the “Excise Tax Liability”). |
| • | If (a) FIAC or DevvStream terminate the Business Combination Agreement as a result of a mutual written consent, the Required SPAC Shareholder Approval (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement) not being obtained, or the Effective Time not occurring by the Outside Date or (b) DevvStream terminates the Business Combination Agreement due to a breach of any representation or warranty by FIAC or Amalco Sub, then all expenses incurred in connection with the Business Combination Agreement and the Proposed Transactions will be paid by the party incurring such expenses, and no party will have any liability to any other party for any other expenses or fees. |
If (a) FIAC or DevvStream terminate the Business Combination Agreement due to the Required Company Shareholder Approval not being obtained or (b) DevvStream terminates the Business Combination Agreement due to a change in recommendation, or the approval, or authorization by DevvStream’s board of directors or DevvStream entering into a Superior Proposal or (c) FIAC terminates the Business Combination Agreement due to a breach of any representation or warranty by DevvStream or a Company Material Adverse Effect, DevvStream will pay to FIAC all expenses incurred by FIAC in connection with the Business Combination Agreement and the Proposed Transactions up to the date of such termination (including (i) SPAC Specified Expenses incurred in connection with the transactions, including SPAC Extension Expenses (as defined in the Business Combination Agreement) and (ii) any Excise Tax Liability provided that, solely with respect to Excise Tax Liability, notice of such termination is provided after December 1, 2023).
In connection with signing the Business Combination Agreement, FIAC and the sponsor entered into a letter agreement, dated September 12, 2023 (the “Sponsor Side Letter”), pursuant to which the sponsor agreed to forfeit (i) 10% of its founder shares effective as of the consummation of the FIAC Continuance at the closing of the Proposed Transactions and (ii) with the sponsor’s consent, up to 30% of its founder shares and/or private placement warrants in connection with financing or non-redemption arrangements, if any, entered into prior to consummation of the Business Combination if any, negotiated by the Effective Date. Pursuant to the Sponsor Side Letter, the sponsor also agreed to (1) certain transfer restrictions with respect to our securities, lock-up restrictions (terminating upon the earlier of: (A) 360 days after the Closing Date, (B) a liquidation, merger, capital stock exchange, reorganization or other similar transaction that results in all of New PubCo’s stockholders having the right to exchange their equity for cash, securities or other property or (C) subsequent to the Closing Date, the closing price of the New Pubco Common Shares equaling or exceeding $12.00 per share (as adjusted for stock splits, stock dividends, reorganizations, recapitalizations and the like) for any 20 trading days within a 30-trading day period commencing at least 150 days after the Closing) and (2) to vote any FIAC shares held by it in favor of the Business Combination Agreement, the arrangement resolution and the Proposed Transactions, and provided customary representations and warranties and covenants related to the foregoing.
Company Support & Lock-up Agreement
In connection with signing the Business Combination Agreement, Devvstream, FIAC and the Core Company Securityholders entered into the Company Support Agreements, dated September 12, 2023, pursuant to which (i) each of the Core Company Securityholders agreed to vote any Company Shares held by him, her or it in favor of the Business Combination Agreement, the arrangement resolution and the Proposed Transactions, and provided customary representations and warranties and covenants related to the foregoing, and (ii) each of the Core Company Securityholders has agreed to certain transfer restrictions with respect to DevvStream securities prior to the Effective Time and lock-up restrictions with respect to the New PubCo Common Shares to be received by such Core Company Securityholder under the Business Combination Agreement, which lock-up restrictions are consistent with those agreed to by the sponsor in the Sponsor Side Letter.
Registration Rights Agreement
At the closing of the Business Combination, it is anticipated that the FIAC, the sponsor, and certain existing holders of Devvstream securities (the “Legacy Devvstream Holders”) will enter into an Amended and Restated Registration Rights Agreement (the “Registration Rights Agreement”), pursuant to which, among other things, the Legacy Devvstream Holders and the sponsor will be granted customary registration rights with respect to shares of the post-Business Combination company.
For additional information about the Business Combination, please refer to our registration statement on Form S-4 initially filed with the SEC on December 4, 2023, as amended from time to time.
Our Mission
Our mission is to amplify social impact by elevating the profile of Social-Forward Companies in public markets. We observe that, traditionally, companies create economic value through the deployment of strategic capital into their goods, services, people and processes for the benefit of shareholders. However, we believe that in addition to such traditional methods of value creation, businesses can incrementally increase economic value by intentionally pursuing social impact and generating positive outcomes for their stakeholders. Although there are many ways to pursue social impact, we chose to focus on those companies actively or intending to become meaningfully aligned with UN SDGs Three, Four, Eight and Ten in their business models, leadership, investment in employees or commitment to community.
It is our conviction that our process of identifying and investing in a Social-Forward Company will drive an increase of attention and equity capital towards this company specifically and similar companies in general; increase awareness of social issues related to SDGs Three, Four, Eight and Ten; and contribute simultaneously to economic growth and social impact. We further believe that investing in such a business represents an attractive and underappreciated economic opportunity for the benefit of all participating stakeholders.
We intend to demonstrate the incremental value available to Social-Forward Companies not only by means of our investment criteria and operational objectives but in other aspects of our company. Recognizing value in diversity is a key component of driving social impact. Founded by a BIPOC leadership group, our company has purposefully and carefully curated a group of directors and advisors comprised of BIPOC and women leaders. In addition, we are working with BIPOC- or women-led teams for underwriting, accounting and auditing services. We believe our unique combination of experiences and perspectives will help us accomplish our mission as a partner, while enhancing our attractiveness to potential target companies.
Our hope is that our company serves not only as a precedent but also as an inspiration and catalyst for other social-forward leaders interested in creating financial and social value through public market participation.
The Current Situation and Our Opportunity
Our focus on Social-Forward Companies aligns with what we believe are prominent and long-term social and economic trends. We assert that a confluence of factors creates opportunities for a blank check company such as ours.
There is a growing body of evidence that companies with a strong social profile—thatprofile-that is, those with a commitment to the “S” in ESG—outperformESG-outperform those with a weak social profile. For example, data provider MSCI has found that, over a 13-year back-tested period, top quintile “S” companies in the MSCI World Index outperformed bottom quintile companies in terms of both return and risk-adjusted return. Non-profit organization JUST Capital has found that, for the twelve months following the onset of COVID-19 in February 2020,calendar year 2021, the cumulative return of Russell 1000 companies in the top quintile when scored for workforce investment and training outperformed that of bottom quintile companiesthe broader Russell 1000 by over 5%. Our team members have each in her/his own context directly observed the organizational performance benefits of a social impact orientation, whether expressed in the social purpose of a business, contributions to a community, diversity and inclusion or other ways.
Recent years have seen a surge in attention to Environmental, Social and Governance factors as indicators of risk, opportunity and long-term, sustainable value. According to the latest Global Sustainable Investment Alliance Review in 2018,2020, the pool of assets seeking ESG-aligned strategies that year topped $30$35 trillion, and we believe this number to have grown since then. Many companies are also aligning around the UN SDG framework for measuring and reporting their sustainability impacts and contributions. Per the 2020 UN Global Compact Progress Report, of the 615 companies surveyed, 84% reported taking specific action to advance the SDGs, and only 39% of companies believed their own targets were sufficiently ambitious. In the finance community, firms with assets under management of over $103$121 trillion had signed the UN Principles for Responsible Investment as of March 2020.December 2022.
While the ESG concept is gaining traction, the attention has not been equally distributed across the E, S and G factors nor across the SDGs. A 2017 study by the New York University Stern Center for Business and Human Rights found that the “S” factors in ESG frameworks were either too vague or too limited to provide insight into corporate performance. In a 20192021 BNP Paribas survey, 46%51% of the 347356 respondents indicated that the “S” component was the most difficult element to incorporate into their investment analysis. However, COVID-19 has put into sharp focus the importance of social factors generally and unequal access to healthcare and technology among different groups in the United States in particular. We assert that the pandemic has set back our country’s progress with regard to SDGs Three, Four, Eight and Ten.
The need for corporations and the private sector to be intentional about social impact is clear. Even before COVID-19, the influential Business Roundtable Group in 2019 expanded its definition of the purpose of a corporation to consider the needs of stakeholders beyond shareholders, committing signatories to invest in employees and support communities, among other items. In the intervening months, we have observed many companies make strong commitments aligned with our select SDGs and focus on BIPOC and women. Nasdaq has proposed new board diversity listing requirements for companies on its U.S. exchange, and our underwriters on this transactionof our initial public offering have both committed to expanding capital access to under-represented and under-financed minority populations. According to the 2020 Edelman Trust Barometer for institutional investors, “S” jumped from being the least important ESG factor in past years to the most important factor for U.S. participants of the survey.
As we seek to leverage these trends and findings, we choose to focus on those companies materially aligned to promote the achievement of SDGs Three (Good Health and Well-being), Four (Quality Education), Eight (Decent Work and Economic Growth) or Ten (Reduced Inequality). While we believe that all the SDGs are crucial to creating a more sustainable future, we feel our team’s combined experience is most relevant to these areas, and we further believe that there is extraordinary economic opportunity for the industries and companies addressing these themes. It is our belief that companies in our target sectors can address the underlying challenges in our select SDGs. Across EdTech, tech-enabled manufacturing and services, FinTech and Health Tech, as well as BIPOC and women-led or focused businesses, we see opportunity to invest in companies positioned to improve access to services and drive social impact in the United States.
EdTech ($227 billion).EdTech. According to industry data, global revenues for education technology were estimated to be $227 billion in 2020 and are projected to grow to over $400 billion by 2025. Growth in the sector accelerated through the COVID-19 pandemic as schools, universities and training centers reverted to remote learning, and we do not believe the world will return to the same degree of in-person instruction post-COVID. We view EdTech as being essential to providing educational and up-skilling opportunities for life-long learners regardless of where they are located. The U.S. accounted for 31% of global VC spending in the education sector from 2010 to the first half of 2020.
Tech-Enabled Manufacturing and Services ($215 billion). According to industry data, global revenues for the tech-enabled manufacturing sector were estimated to be $215 billion in 2020 and are projected to reach $385 billion by 2025. McKinsey & Company, in a 2018 report, estimated that a technology-enabled transformation of the global industrials sector could generate between $0.8 and $2.0 trillion in total return to shareholders through revenue growth and margin expansion. Real-time operational optimization, robotics, robust data analytics, enhanced safety, processes in automated communication with each other and the software to manage these new networks are driving change in the workplace. While we expect that these trends will to some extent inevitably lead to the replacement of labor with capital, these changes also have the potential to improve the nature of work and introduce new types of professions.
FinTech ($149 billion). FinTech start-ups and growth-stage companies are disrupting the delivery and operations of financial services. In our view, such disruptive companies could not only improve the provision of financial services to existing customers but also meaningfully expand access to financial services to previously underserved groups—includinggroups-including BIPOC and women. According to a Deloitte report, FinTech generated $126 billion of estimated global revenue in 2020, and this revenue will grow at a projected 11.7% compound annual growth rate from 2019 through 2024. However, weWe believe that traditional financial firms are foregoing a substantial market opportunity by failing to adequately provide services to BIPOC and women customers. We believe that the value of these markets will accrue to the FinTech firms expanding access to services through innovation.
Health Tech ($96.5 billion). The integration of application software, distributed connectivity, artificial intelligence, wearables, and personalization insights into the healthcare system is reshaping the healthcare sector. According to industry data, the healthcare technology sector is estimated to have generated $96.5 billion of global revenue in 2020, with North America accounting for almost 40% of this value. A 2020 McKinsey & Company report predicted that the sustained expansion of telehealth in the post-COVID period could shift $250 billion of U.S. healthcare expenditures to virtual or near-virtual care in the near future, which would equate to 20% of total 2020 office, outpatient, and home health spending. We believe that this has the potential to greatly expand access to health services and that other components of the Health Tech vertical could be equally revolutionary.
Led by, Founded by or Serving BIPOC and Women. We know that BIPOC- and women-led or focused businesses suffer from disadvantaged access to capital. In 2020, the share of venture capital flowing to women-founded companies fell from 2.8% in 2019 to 2.3%, per Crunchbase data. CrunchbaseThe World Economic Form similarly foundreported that, as of September 2020,investments in Black founded startups plummeted by 45% in 2022 while, the share of venture capital funding year-to-date supporting Black and Latinx founderswomen was only 2.6%. According to a 2021 Fundera report, based on U.S. Federal Reserve data, banks extended financing to four-fifths0.34% of white business owners applying for a loan, whereas BIPOC owners were successful only two-thirds ofall total venture capital spent in the time.US. It is our conviction that BIPOC- and women-led or focused businesses are being under-financed and under-valued, and we might choose to provide capital to a compelling business outside of our four core sectors as long as it otherwise meets our investment criteria.
Our target business does not need to already be a leader relative to its peers in terms of social forward-best practices. By working with the company, we intend to unlock, together, the full value of its social investments in its business model, leadership, investment in its employees and commitment to its community. We believe our focus on Social-Forward Companies will help drive increased public market access for such companies, emphasize their competitive advantages in today’s markets and in the future, and set an example for other demonstrated or aspirational social-forward leaders. By these means, we hope to amplify corporate social impact beyond just our own efforts.
Our Team, Auldbrass Partners, and Advisory Board
Our company’s officers, directors, affiliation with Auldbrass Partners and advisors bring together complementary expertise, resources and networks in addition to their experience leading organizations and executing transactions across business cycles. Our officers, directors, and advisors as well as professionals at Auldbrass Partners also have experience transacting with and guiding growth companies in private markets. Further, several of our team have previously implemented socially-forward programs in other organizations. We believe in the corporate value of amplifying social impact based on direct experience. For these reasons, we believe we are well positioned to identify and complete an attractive business combination and can deliver upon a differentiated strategy.
Our Team
The management team consists of Carl Stanton (CEO)(CEO and Director), Ernest Lyles (CFO) and Wray Thorn (CIO). Our board of directors includes Wes Moore (Chairman)Howard Sanders (Lead Director), Troy Carter (Independent Director), Howard Sanders (Director),Dawanna Williams (Independent Director) and Dawanna WilliamsDia Simms (Independent Director).
Our team is comprised of professionals with experience in investment banking, operational management, technology, marketing, corporate governance, leadership development, and other areas of potential value to our company and our target business. We are all aligned with regard to the value of Social-Forward Companies. We intend to leverage our team’s expertise and networks to both identify a range of potential target businesses and create shareholder value in the initial business combination.
7Carl M. Stanton, Chief Executive Officer and Director
Westley (“Wes”) W. O. Moore, Chairman. Wes MooreFocus Impact Partners, LLC and currently serves as our Chief Executive Officer and director and as the Chief Executive Officer and a director on the boards of IAC, Under Armour Inc. and LongviewFocus Impact BH3 Acquisition Corp. II. Wes was the chief executive officer of Robin Hood Foundation, one of the nation’s largest anti-poverty focused charities, until May 2021. Before becoming CEO at Robin Hood, Wes was the founder and CEO at BridgeEdU, an education platform based in Baltimore addressing the college completion and job placement crisis by reinventing freshman year for underserved students. BridgeEdU was acquired by Edquity,Company, a Brooklyn-based student financial success and emergency aid firm, in June 2019. Wes also served as a White House Fellow to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and, prior to that, served as a captain and paratrooper with the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, including a combat deployment to Afghanistan. Wes has also worked in finance as an investment banker with Deutsche Bank in London and with Citigroup in New York.
Wes earned an MLitt in International Relations from Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar in 2004, and he graduated Phi Theta Kappa from Valley Forge Military College in 1998 and Phi Beta Kappa from Johns Hopkins University in 2001. Wes is also the author of The New York Times bestseller “The Other Wes Moore,” which has been optioned by executive producer Oprah Winfrey and HBO to be made into a movie, as well as four other bestselling books, “The Work,” “Discovering Wes Moore,” “This Way Home” and the recently released, “Five Days”
Troy Carter, Independent Director. Troy Carter is the founder and CEO of Q&A, a music technology company focused on building software solutions for recording artists via distribution and analytics. He also serves as an advisor to the NBA Players Association and The Prince Estate. Prior to founding Q&A, Troy was Global Head of Creator Services at Spotify from 2016 to 2018 and then served in a consulting role for CEO Daniel Ek until 2019. Troy serves on the boards of WeTransfer and SoundCloud, and served as an advisor to Lyft. He is also an active early stage investor, including in companies such as Uber, Lyft, Dropbox, Spotify, Slack, Warby Parker, Gimlet Media, and Thrive Market. Troy previously founded the entertainment company, Atom Factory, in 2008, where he worked with Lady Gaga, John Legend and Meghan Trainor.
Troy is an executive member on the boards of trustees at The Aspen Institute and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art as well as a Henry Crown Fellow. In addition, he is a member of the United Nations Foundation Global Entrepreneurs Council. Troy also has served on the boards of directors of the Los Angeles Mayor’s Council for Technology & Innovation and CalArts. Troy has previously been included on Fast Company’s list of most creative people and on Billboard’s Power 100 list, an annual ranking the music industry’s top influencers.
Ernest D. Lyles II, CFO. Ernest Lyles is the CEO of The HiGro Group, a mission driven private equity firm focused on buyout investing in the lower middle market, which he founded in 2016. As CEO, Ernest oversees all aspects of the firm including investment activities, growth initiatives and talent management. Additionally, he serves as a board observer of EMSAR and lead director of DRS Imaging Services, two HiGro portfolio companies. Prior to founding The HiGro Group, Ernest spent a decade as an investment banker with UBS Investment Bank where his tenure included advising the world’s most notable corporations and private equity firms. As the head of technology and business services at UBS Investment Bank, Ernest became the most senior African-American investment banker within the firm's industry coverage groups.
Ernest serves as a director on the boards of the Citizens Committee for New York, Scan / Harbor, Manhattan Country School and the West Harlem Development Corporation. Ernest also is a member of the New York Economic Club and Founder of the UTULIVU Group, a mission driven non-profit focused on the continuity of holistic achievement by high performing Black men. Ernest attended The Howard University School of Law in Washington DC and Shepherd University in West Virginia.
Howard L. Sanders, Director. Howard Sanders is the managing member of Auldbrass Partners, a growth-focused private equity firm investing primarily in secondaries transactions, which he founded in 2011. Howard heads Auldbrass Partners’ transactional sourcing, deal execution, investment strategy and business development. He has led successful Auldbrass Partners investments in SaaS (Software as a Service), PaaS (Platform as a Service), Tech-enabled manufacturing and services, Healthcare and EdTech companies. Before founding Auldbrass Partners, Howard was a managing director at Citigroup where he was responsible formanaging and directing Citi Holdings’ proprietary investments in private equity, hedge funds and real estate. Prior to Citi, Howard was a vice president in mergers and acquisitions for Deutsche Bank (a successor to James D. Wolfensohn and Co.)special purpose acquisition corporation (Nasdaq: BHAC). He also previously served as an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School.
Howard is currently a board member of the Partnership for New York City Foundation, the Riverside Church in the City of New York and the Undergraduate Executive Board of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He holds an MBA from Harvard University and a BS from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
Carl M. Stanton, CEO. Carl brings nearly three decades of experience in leading companies across transformative Private Equity/Alternative Asset management with a proven track record in creating shareholder value. Carl has unique knowledge and skills across all facets of Asset Management. He is a team builder and has managed and co-led two Alternative Asset Management firms totaling over $4.5 billion AUM, and has delivered best-in-class investment performance results along with colleagues over multiple funds.
He has advised CEOs, CFOs, and Boardsboards of Directorsdirectors of multiple companies and spread managerial, financial, and strategic best practices with demonstrated expertise in value creation strategies including revenue growth strategies, industry transformation, cost control, supply chain management, and technology best practices. Carl has also served as Board Member to more than 15 portfolio companies across Industrial Products & Services, Transportation & Logistics and Consumer industries.industries; including his current role as a Board Member of Skipper Pets, Inc.
Carl is former Managing Partner and Head of Private Equity for Invesco Private Capital, a division of Invesco, Ltd. (NYSE: IVZ), which managed private investment vehicles across private equity, venture capital, and real estate. At Invesco Private Capital, Carl was responsible for overseeing multiple alternative asset investment Funds and served as Chair of Investment Committee for domestic PE efforts. Prior to Invesco, Carl served as Managing Partner and co-owner at Wellspring Capital Management LLC, a private equity investment firm focused on control investments in growing companies in the industrial products & services, healthcare and consumer industries. He oversaw and approved all investments as a member of the Investment Committee. At the time of his retirement in 2015, the firm had invested more than $2.5 billion in 35 platform companies and achieved top-tier investment results.
Currently, Carl serves as the Founder of cbGrowth Partners, which focuses on sustainable investments, and serves as Advisor to Auldbrass Partners. Previously, Carl worked at Dimeling, Schreiber & Park, Peter J Solomon & Co, Associates, and Ernst & Young Corporate Finance LLC. Mr. Stanton holds a BS degree in Accounting from the University of Alabama and an MBA degree from Harvard Business School. He resides in New York with his family and serves as Trustee, Treasurer and Head of Finance and Endowment Committee of Christ Church United Methodist, a nonprofit organization. He also serves as Board of Visitors at the University of Alabama, College of Commerce. We believe Carl’s significant experience of leading companies across transformative private equity and asset management and extensive experience with special purpose acquisition companies makes him well qualified to serve as a member of our board of directors.
Ernest D. Lyles II, Chief Financial Officer. Ernest serves as our Chief Financial Officer and as the Chief Financial Officer and a director of Focus Impact BH3 Acquisition Company, a special purpose acquisition corporation (Nasdaq: BHAC). Ernest is also the Founder and a Managing Partner of The HiGro Group, a private equity firm focused on buyout investing in the lower middle market, which he founded in 2016. In addition to serving as a board member on HiGro’s portfolio companies, Ernest co-manages all aspects of the firm’s including investment activities, growth initiatives and talent development.
Prior to founding The HiGro Group, Ernest spent a decade as an investment banker with UBS Investment Bank where his tenure included advising the world’s most notable corporations and private equity firms. As the head of Technology Enabled Services banking practice, Ernest became the most senior African-American investment banker within the firm’s industry coverage groups. In addition to his over $10 billion of transaction and advisory experience, Ernest served as Head of the Diversity Task Force and Head of the Howard University recruiting team among other internal committees.
A native of Shepherdstown, West Virginia, Ernest attended public schools and earned a full merit scholarship to attend Shepherd University, where he earned a Bachelors of Science degree with concentrations in Political Science and Business Administration. Upon graduation, Ernest enrolled in the Howard University School of Law, where he also interned at both the JC Watts Companies. Ernest has held expert discussions on entrepreneurship, mentorship, private equity, impact investing and work-life balance. His speaking engagements have included companies such as Google, HEC Paris, McGuire Woods and Nomura. An avid art collector, Ernest has also been featured in publications such as “The Black Market: A Guide to Art Collecting.
Ernest currently lives in Harlem, New York, where he is actively engaged in civic and faith initiatives including Trustee to Scan Boys and Girls Harbor, Founder of The UTULIVU Alliance, Member of the Economic Club of New York, and Fellow in the Council of Urban Professionals.
Wray T. Thorn, CIO.Chief Investment Officer. Wray is a Partner and Co-Founder of Focus Impact Partners, LLC and currently serves as our Chief Investment Officer and as the Chief Investment Officer and a director of Focus Impact BH3 Acquisition Company, a special purpose acquisition corporation (Nasdaq: BHAC). Wray is also the Founder and Chief Executive of Clear Heights Capital, a private investment firm committed to helping companies realize their growth and development objectives.objectives and a Board Member of Skipper Pets, Inc. Wray is deeply involved in building and leading businesses to source, structure, finance and make private investments as well as helping companies, organizations and executives realize their growth and development objectives. With over twothree decades of experience as a Chief Investment Officer, investment leader and lead director, Wray has firsthand knowledge of investment firm leadership, private investing and company value creation.creation, asset allocation strategy and practice and risk management frameworks. Wray has also been at the forefront of proactive ESG principals, putting people first in privateimpact investing as well asand applying data and technology to innovate private investing.
Prior to founding Focus Impact and Clear Heights, Capital, Wray was Managing Director and Chief Investment Officer—Private Investments at Two Sigma Investments. Wray architected and led the firm’s private equity (Sightway Capital), venture capital (Two Sigma Ventures) and impact (Two Sigma Impact) investment businesses as Chief Executive and Chief Investment Officer of TSPI, LP and Chair & Venture Partner of TSV. During his 9-year tenure,Initially on behalf of private capital and expanding to include institutional investors, Wray grew the private investment businesses during his 9-year tenure to nearly $4 billion in AUM and 90 team members withand was a leader in the dual objectivescreation of building differentiated direct private investment businesses that capitalized onHamilton Insurance Group and the incubation of Two Sigma’s capabilities in data science andinsurance technology through which a portion of the firm’s proprietary capital could be invested alongside external investor capital.
Beforeactivities, Prior to Two Sigma, Wray was a Senior Managing Director with Marathon Asset Management, where he was a senior member of the investment team, developed the firm’s private equity investment activities and played a role in many new business opportunities and capital formation initiatives, forincluding the firm.firm’s direct lending business and its participation in the US Treasury’s Legacy Securities Public-Private Investment Program.. Prior to joining Marathon, Wray evaluated and executed management buyout transactions as a Director with Fox Paine & Co. and as a Principal at Dubilier & Co. Wray began his career in the financial analyst program at Chemical Bank (today, J.P. Morgan) as an Associate in the Acquisition Finance Group.
Wray has been involved in approximately 290300 transactions, add-on acquisitions, realizations, corporate financings, fundraisings and other principal transactions with aggregate consideration in excess of $32 billion, including direct private equity, venture and third-party managed fund investments representing more than $2.8$3 billion in invested capital. Wray has been a part of driving shareholder value creation and corporate growth as member of boards, advisory boards and committees ofor as an adviser for more than 3045 companies and investment funds, across industries including technology, financial services, education, consumer services and real assets. Working with both private capital organizations and institutional investors, Wray has architected and led multiple private investment businesses, defining investment objectives, devising strategy, recruiting team members, setting culture, developing investor and financing relationships, and managing investment processes and decisions.
Wray is committed to giving back to the community, serving as Co-Chair of the Board of Youth, INC, as Vice Chair of the Board and Chair of the Investment Committee for Futures and Options, as a grant monitor and event committee chair for Hour Children, and as an Associate of the Harvard College Fund and previously as the founding President of the Saint Stephen of Hungary School Foundation.Fund. In his 15+ years working with Youth, INC, a venture philanthropy nonprofit organization in New York City, Wray has engaged in many aspects of the organization’s growth and development including recruiting senior leadership, leading strategic planning initiatives, chairing the governance and compensation committees and being a part of raising more than $100 million to transformimpact the lives of NYC youth by empowering more than 175 grass-roots non-profits that serve them. Wray earned an A.B. from Harvard University.
Howard L. Sanders, Lead Director. Howard Sanders serves as our lead director and is the managing member of Auldbrass Partners, a growth-focused private equity firm investing primarily in secondaries transactions, which he founded in 2011. Mr. Sanders heads Auldbrass Partners’ transactional sourcing, deal execution, investment strategy and business development. Mr. Sanders has led successful Auldbrass Partners investments in SaaS (Software as a Service), PaaS (Platform as a Service), tech-enabled manufacturing and services, healthcare and EdTech companies. Before founding Auldbrass Partners, Mr. Sanders was a Managing Director at Citigroup where he was responsible for managing and directing Citi Holdings’ proprietary investments in private equity, hedge funds and real estate. Prior to Citi, Mr. Sanders was a Vice President in mergers and acquisitions for Deutsche Bank (a successor to James D. Wolfensohn and Co.). Mr. Sanders also previously served as an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School.
Mr. Sanders is currently a board member of the Partnership for New York City Foundation, the Riverside Church in the City of New York and the Undergraduate Executive Board of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Mr. Sanders holds a Master of Business Administration from Harvard University and a Bachelor of Science from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. We believe that Mr. Sanders’ significant experience in investment management leadership, company and private equity fund evaluation and analysis and investment banking leadership make him well qualified to serve as a member of our board of directors.
Troy Carter, Independent Director. Troy serves as our independent director and is the founder and CEO of Q&A, a music technology company focused on building software solutions for recording artists via distribution and analytics. Troy currently serves as a director of Focus Impact BH3 Acquisition Company, a special purpose acquisition corporation (Nasdaq: BHAC). He also serves as an advisor to the NBA Players Association. He previously served as an advisor to the Prince Estate. Prior to founding Q&A, Troy was Global Head of Creator Services at Spotify from 2016 to 2018 and then served in a consulting role for CEO Daniel Ek until 2019. Troy serves on the boards of WeTransfer and SoundCloud, and served as an advisor to Lyft. He is also an active early stage investor, including in companies such as Uber, Lyft, Dropbox, Spotify, Slack, Warby Parker, Gimlet Media, and Thrive Market. Troy previously founded the entertainment company, Atom Factory, in 2008, where he worked with Lady Gaga, John Legend and Meghan Trainor.
Troy is an executive member on the boards of trustees at The Aspen Institute and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art as well as a Henry Crown Fellow. In addition, he is a member of the United Nations Foundation Global Entrepreneurs Council. Troy also has served on the boards of directors of the Los Angeles Mayor’s Council for Technology & Innovation and CalArts. Troy has previously been included on Fast Company’s list of most creative people and on Billboard’s Power 100 list, an annual ranking the music industry’s top influencers. We believe Troy’s significant business experience in various technology companies and his experience serving on the boards of technology companies makes him well qualified to serve as a member of our board of directors.
Dawanna Williams, Independent Director.Director Dawanna. Ms. Williams serves as our independent director and as the managing principal at Dabar Development Partners, which sheMs. Williams founded over 15 years ago. Dabar has developed over 3,000 apartments units covering more than 2 million square feet of mixed-use developments and has had principal involvement in development projects awarded by NYC’SNYC’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development, (HPD), NYC’s Economic Development Corporation, (EDC), and New York City’s Housing Authority (NYCHA).Authority. As managing principal, sheMs. Williams is involved in all executive aspects of business operations, from developing strategic priorities to executing development projects to risk management to establishing firm values and standards. Prior to Dabar, DawannaMs. Williams served as General Counsel at Victory Education Partners and as a senior associate in the commercial real estate group at Sidley Austin LLP.
DawannaMs. Williams serves on the board of directors of ACRES Commercial Realty Corp. (NYSE: ACR) is a real estate investment trust that is primarily focused on originating, holding and managing commercial real estate (“CRE”) mortgage loans and other commercial real estate-related debt investments, Compass, Inc., (NYSE: COMP), a publicly-traded, technology-enabled residential real estate brokerage company and Ares Industrial Real Estate Income Trust Inc., a real estate investment trust. Ms. Williams also serves on the board of directors of the Apollo Theater, chairing the real estate committee, and on the board of directors for the New York City Trust for Cultural Resources. SheMs. Williams also serves on the board of directors of the New York Real Estate Chamber. DawannaMs. Williams earned an A.B. from Smith College in economics and government, a masterMaster of public administrationPublic Administration from Harvard University Kennedy School of Government, and a doctorDoctor of jurisprudenceJurisprudence from the University of Maryland School of Law. We believe that Ms. Williams’ experience in investment management, her background in transaction law and corporate governance and her public company board experience make her well qualified to serve as a member of our board of directors.
Dia Simms, Independent Director.Dia serves as our independent director and as the Executive Chairwoman of the Board of Lobos 1707 Tequila & Mezcal, an award-winning, independent spirits brand that launched in November 2020. Before being appointed Executive Chairwoman, Dia led Lobos 1707 as its CEO, alongside Founder and Chief Creative Officer Diego Osorio with early backing by sports and cultural icon, LeBron James. Dia currently serves as a director of Focus Impact BH3 Acquisition Company, a special purpose acquisition corporation, (Nasdaq: BHAC). Dia is also Co-Founder of Pronghorn, a 10-year initiative to drive diversity, equity and inclusion in the spirits industry. Dia spent almost fifteen years working alongside Sean “Diddy” Combs at Combs Enterprises. In 2017, Dia was named President of Combs Enterprises, making her the first president in the company’s thirty-year history other than Sean Combs himself. In her role as President, she oversaw multi-billion-dollar brands under the Combs empire, including CÎROC Ultra-Premium Vodka, Blue Flame Agency, AQUAhydrate, Bad Boy Entertainment, Sean John and Revolt TV. Of note, Dia led the transformation of CÎROC Ultra-Premium Vodka from infancy to a multibillion dollar value brand.
Along with a lengthy list of accolades, Dia is Board Chair of Pronghorn, Board Vice Chair of Saint Liberty Whiskey, Advisor to Touch Capital and director on the FIAC Board. Dia holds a B.S. degree in Psychology from Morgan State University and a Master’s degree in Management from the Florida Institute of Technology. We believe Dia’s significant business experience as a CEO and significant deal-making experience make her well qualified to serve as a member of our board of directors.
Our sponsor may offer incentives, including an indirect interest in our sponsor, to any members of our team who materially contribute to the identification or execution of our initial business combination. The incentives available to our team will also be available on the same terms to our advisors and affiliates of Auldbrass Partners.
Auldbrass Partners
Auldbrass Partners is a private equity firm founded in 2011 and located in New York City. Auldbrass Partners has monitored and managed approximately $1.5 billion of global investments in growth, buyout, mezzanine, and venture capital and has an expansive pricing application analyzing over 300 investment funds, with over 5,000 active underlying companies. Auldbrass Partners leverages this database (“Thesys,” now in its third iteration) to efficiently identify, evaluate and invest in private equity high growth opportunities through secondaries transactions.
Prior to the formation of Auldbrass Partners, our team (in aggregate) completed over $3.8 billion (500 funds) in secondary transactions across private equity, real estate, hedge fund side pockets, and mezzanine funds, with assets located in Europe, Asia, and North America. The Auldbrass Partners investment team also has significant primary and secondary investment experience as well as market knowledge across several alternative asset classes and maintains long-term relationships with 200 top-tier fund managers.
Figure: Example Auldbrass Partner Portfolio Investments as of March 31, 2021.
Through Auldbrass Partners’ activities as a leading secondaries investor in middle market and late-stage growth portfolios, the firm and its employees have deep relationships across the private equity eco-sphere, and a sophisticated database of privately-owned companies (Thesys) that includes detailed, company-level information. Auldbrass Partners has successfully utilized Thesys to drive deal flow and will assist the company in the discovery of actionable opportunities and enhance strategic analysis.
Advisory Board
Our advisory board brings a unique and powerful blend of executive, investment, corporate strategy, talent development, sales and marketing, corporate finance, and social impact experience. We have purposefully and carefully curated an advisory board, the members of which bring complementary skills. We believe our advisory board members support our ability to identify and drive value in our initial business combination through their sourcing channels, relationship networks and leadership. We are confident that our advisory board members commit meaningful time and resources to assisting our company achieve our mission.
The members of our advisory board assist our management team with sourcing and evaluating business opportunities and devising plans and strategies to optimize any business that we acquire following the consummation of our initial public offering. However, unlike our management team, members of our advisory board are not responsible for managing our day-to-day affairs and have no authority to engage in substantive discussions with business combination targets on our behalf. Members of our advisory board are neither paid nor reimbursed for any out-of-pocket expenses in connection with the search of business combination targets before or after the consummation of our initial business combination. We have not currently entered into any formal arrangements or agreements with the members of our advisory board to provide services to us, and they will have no fiduciary obligations to present business opportunities to us.
We believe that the experience and capabilities of our management, combined with the resources of Auldbrass Partners and our board of directors and advisory board, enhance our attractiveness to potential target businesses, enable us to pursue a broad range of opportunities, strengthen our ability to complete a successful combination, and drive our pursuit of financially and socially value-accretive operating practices and policies upon the completion of the initial business combination.
With respect to the above, past performance of our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board or their respective affiliates is not a guarantee of either (i) success with respect to a business combination that may be consummated or (ii) the ability to successfully identify and execute a transaction. You should not rely on the historical record of our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board and their respective affiliates as indicative of future performance. See “Risk Factors —- Past performance by our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board and their respective affiliates may not be indicative of future performance of an investment in us.” Our management has no prior experience in operating blank check companies or special purpose acquisition companies. For a list of our executive officers and entities for which a conflict of interest may or does exist between such officers and the company, please refer to “Management —- Conflicts of Interest.”
Our management team, sponsor, officers and directors may sponsor, form or participate in other blank check companies similar to ours during the period in which we are seeking an initial business combination. Any such companies may present additional conflicts of interest in pursuing an acquisition target, particularly in the event there is overlap among investment mandates. However, we do not currently expect that any such other blank check company would materially affect our ability to complete our initial business combination. In addition, our officers and directors are not required to commit any specified amount of time to our affairs, and, accordingly, will have conflicts of interest in allocating management time among various business activities, including identifying potential business combinations and monitoring the related due diligence.
Our Business Strategy
Although we may pursue an initial business combination in any industry or geographic location, we intend to focus on high-growth businesses in the EdTech, technology-enabled manufacturing and services, FinTech and Health Tech sectors, as well as on compelling companies in these or other sectors led by, founded by or serving BIPOC or women in the United States. Based on the experiences of our officers, directors, partner and advisors, we believe that within this universe of businesses are many promising potential targets that could become attractive public companies with long-term growth opportunities and attractive competitive positioning. We believe that there are a large number of Social-Forward Companies in these sectors.
In executing our search and initial business combination, we plan to leverage the broad networks and complementary expertise of our officers, directors, advisory board members and Auldbrass Partners. We will also seek to attract promising private businesses to our company by emphasizing our ability to amplify the socially-forward aspects of a target business and unlock greater value from even an otherwise strong business. We believe that this combination of factors will bolster our ability to successfully complete a business acquisition that will enhance the overall value of our target and fulfill our mission.
We hope that our example inspires other companies and investors to enhance their own support for health and well-being, quality education, broad-based economic growth, decent work and greater economic equality in the United States.
Our networks and expertise have been developed through the experience of our officers, directors, partner and advisor by means of:
Sourcing, structuring, acquiring, integrating and selling businesses in and adjacent to our target sectors;
Operating sophisticated business and non-profit organizations and executing complex transactions;
Identifying, recruiting and developing promising talent;
Accessing the capital markets and marketing organizations; and,
Advising companies and boards on diverse corporate matters, including but not limited to the integration of socially positive concerns into business operations for value creation.
Our sponsor may offer incentives, including an indirect interest in our sponsor, to any members of our team who materially contribute to the identification or execution of our initial business combination.
Demonstrating Our Commitment to Social Impact
Certain members of our sponsor intend to make a meaningful donation of interests in our sponsor to a charitable cause following the consummation of our initial business combination. We believe that this commitment will be highly appealing to market-leading companies across all sectors.
Our Competitive Advantage
We believe the reputation, sourcing, valuation, diligence and execution capabilities of our officers, directors, Auldbrass Partners and members of our advisory board all contribute towards our ability to generate a pipeline of opportunities from which to select a target business, to successfully execute a combination, and to create value for our shareholders following the combination.
We further believe that conducting our company as a Social-Forward Company and demonstrating our commitment to social impact through our donations make us more attractive to potential business targets and investors, many of which we believe have aligned values.
Our competitive strengths include the following:
Passion to fulfill our mission to develop as a successful public company using our Social-Forward criteria.
Compelling sourcing opportunities and strategic relationships, including our highly differentiated sourcing engine provided via our relationship with secondaries investment firm Auldbrass Partners, as well as the collective networks of our officers, directors, and advisory board members.
Extensive influence and reach through a broad network that spans a range of leaders in business, entertainment, government and philanthropy.
Successful track record of investing, transaction and capital markets experience that demonstrates a strong ability to source, select and execute.
Deep insights into and subject matter expertise in a target-rich universe that provides a large total addressable market.
Values-based leadership attractive to target businesses and with the ability to amplify and validate the efforts of a Social-Forward Company.
Our Combination Criteria
Our search for a combination target will focus on businesses that we believe would benefit from becoming publicly traded companies and stand to benefit from our mission. We believe that our strategy creates a compelling alternative for a growing Social-Forward Company to become a public entity, thereby potentially increasing capital access, gaining liquidity, diversifying investors and otherwise benefiting from participation in public markets.
We have developed a set of high-level investment criteria to guide our search for a target company. In addition to seeking businesses with strong business fundamentals and defined growth opportunities, we plan to prioritize businesses that:
Either demonstrate or appreciate the value of supporting health and well-being, quality education, reducing economic inequality and promoting decent work in the United States.
Are motivated to fulfill our mission and be positioned as, or further developed as, a Social-Forward Company.
Are excited about working with our company to realize in parallel both shareholder and social value.
Are positioned to materially benefit from our officers’ and directors’ knowledge of the target industry and relationships.
Have strong management teams with a clear vision to either maintaining or, if an early-stage business, creating sustainable cash flows.
Are positioned to benefit from access to public capital markets and the merits of being a Social-Forward Company.
While not a requirement, we may prioritize companies with existing revenue and evidence of high growth.
These criteria are not intended to be exhaustive. Any evaluation of a particular initial business combination might be based, to the extent relevant, on these general guidelines as well as on other considerations, factors and criteria that our officers and directors may deem relevant. In the event that our company decides to enter into an initial business combination with a target business that does not meet the above criteria, we would disclose that the target business diverges from the above guidelines in our shareholder communications related to the initial business combination, which, as discussed in this Report, would be in the form of tender offer documents or proxy solicitation materials that we would file with the SEC.
Our Combination Process
In evaluating a prospective target business, we expect to conduct an extensive due diligence review, which may encompass, as applicable and among other things, utilization of independent consultants, meetings with incumbent management and employees, document reviews, interviews of customers and suppliers, inspection of facilities and a review of financial and other information about the target and its industry. Our search for a business combination, ability to consummate a business combination, or the operations of a target business with which we ultimately consummate a business combination may be materially adversely affected by the novel coronavirus (“COVID-19”) outbreak. See “Risk Factors — Our search for a business combination, and any target business with which we ultimately consummate a business combination, may be materially adversely affected by the recent coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak and the status of debt and equity markets.”
We have not selected any potential business combination target, and we have not, nor has anyone on our behalf, contacted any prospective target or had any substantive discussions, directly or indirectly, with any potential target regarding entering into an initial business combination with us.
We are not prohibited from pursuing an initial business combination with a company that is affiliated with or related to Auldbrass Partners, our sponsor, officers, directors or members of our advisory board. In the event we seek to complete our initial business combination with a company that is affiliated with or related to any of Auldbrass Partners, our sponsor, officers, directors or members of our advisory board, we, or a committee of independent and disinterested directors, will obtain an opinion from an independent investment banking firm or another independent entity that commonly renders valuation opinions that such initial business combination is fair to our company from a financial point of view. We are not required to obtain such an opinion in any other context.
First Extension of Combination Period
On April 25, 2023, we held a special meeting of stockholders (the “Extension Meeting”) to amend our amended and restated certificate of incorporation to (i) extend the date (the “Termination Date”) by which we haves to consummate a Business Combination from May 1, 2023 (the “Original Termination Date”) to August 1, 2023 (the “Charter Extension Date”) and to allow us, without another shareholder vote, to elect to extend the Termination Date to consummate a Business Combination on a monthly basis for up to nine times by an additional one month each time after the Charter Extension Date, by resolution of our board of directors if requested by the sponsor, and upon five days’ advance notice prior to the applicable Termination Date, until May 1, 2024, or a total of up to twelve months after the Original Termination Date, unless the closing of our initial business combination shall have occurred prior to such date (such amendment, the “Extension Amendment” and such proposal, the “Extension Amendment Proposal”) and (ii) remove the limitation that we may not redeem public shares to the extent that such redemption would result in us having net tangible assets (as determined in accordance with Rule 3a51-1(g)(1) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, of less than $5,000,000 (such amendment, the “Redemption Limitation Amendment” and such proposal, the “Redemption Limitation Amendment Proposal”). The shareholders of FIAC approved the Extension Amendment Proposal and the Redemption Limitation Amendment Proposal at the Extension Meeting and on April 26, 2023, we filed the Extension Amendment and the Redemption Limitation Amendment with the Secretary of State of Delaware.
In connection with the vote to approve the Extension Amendment Proposal and the Redemption Limitation Amendment Proposal, the holders of 17,297,209 public shares properly exercised their right to redeem their shares for cash at a redemption price of approximately $10.40 per share, for an aggregate redemption amount of $179,860,588.
As disclosed in the proxy statement relating to the Extension Meeting, the sponsor agreed that if the Extension Amendment Proposal is approved, it or one or more of its affiliates, members or third-party designees (the “Lender”) will contribute to the Company as a loan, within ten (10) business days of the date of the Extension Meeting, of the lesser of (a) an aggregate of $487,500 or (b) $0.0975 per share that is not redeemed in connection with the Extension Meeting, to be deposited into the trust account. In addition, in the event we do not consummate an initial business combination by August 1, 2023, the Lender may contribute to us the lesser of (a) $162,500 or (b) $0.0325 per each public share that is not redeemed in connection with the Extension Meeting as a loan to be deposited into the trust account for each of nine one-month extensions following August 1, 2023. As of December 31, 2023 a total of $1,300,000 has been deposited into the trust account, to extend the Termination Date to January 1, 2024.
Second Extension of Combination Period
On December 29, 2023, FIAC held a special meeting of stockholders (the “Second Extension Meeting”) where a proposal was approved to amend FIAC's Certificate of Incorporation to extend the Termination Date from January 1, 2024 to April 1, 2024 (the “Second Charter Extension Date”) and to allow FIAC, without the need for another stockholder vote, to elect to extend the Termination Date to consummate a business combination on a monthly basis for up to seven times, by an additional one month each time, after the Second Charter Extension Date, by resolution of FIAC’s board of directors, if requested by Sponsor (such amendment, the “Second Extension Amendment” and such proposal, the “Second Extension Amendment Proposal”). The shareholders of the Company approved the Second Extension Amendment Proposal at the Second Extension Meeting and on December 29, 2023, the Company filed the Second Extension Amendment with the Secretary of State of Delaware.
In connection with the vote to approve the extension at the Second Extension Meeting, the holders of 3,985,213 shares of Class A Common Stock properly exercised their right to redeem their shares for cash at a redemption price of approximately $10.95 per share, for an aggregate redemption amount of approximately $43,640,022.
As disclosed in the proxy statement relating to the Second Extension Meeting, the sponsor agreed that if the Second Extension Amendment Proposal is approved, the sponsor would deposit into the trust account the lesser of (a) $120,000 and (b) $0.06 per public share that is not redeemed in connection with the Second Extension Meeting. In addition, in the event we do not consummate an initial business combination by April 1, 2024, the Lender may contribute to us the lesser of (a) $40,000 or (b) $0.02 per each public share that is not redeemed in connection with the Extension Meeting as a loan to be deposited into the trust account for each of seven one-month extensions following April 1, 2024. Because the Second Extension Proposal was approved, the sponsor deposited $103,055 into the trust account, and the Termination Date was extended to April 1, 2024. In March 2024, the sponsor deposited $34,352 in the trust account extending the Termination Date by one month to May 1, 2024, which can be extended to November 1, 2024 (with required funding of the Trust Account).
Promissory Notes
In connection with the approval of the Extension Amendment Proposal, on May 9, 2023, the Company issued an unsecured promissory note in the total principal amount of up to $1,500,000 (the “Promissory Note”) to the sponsor and the sponsor funded deposits into the trust account. The Promissory Note does not bear interest and matures upon closing of the Company’s initial Business Combination. In the event that the Company does not consummate a Business Combination, the Promissory Note will be repaid only from amounts remaining outside of the trust account, if any. Up to the total principal amount of the Promissory Note may be converted, in whole or in part, at the option of the Lender into warrants of the Company at a price of $1.00 per warrant, which warrants will be identical to the private placement warrants issued to the sponsor at the time of the Company’s initial public offering. As of December 31, 2023, an aggregate of $1,500,000 has been drawn under the Promissory Note.
In connection with the extension of the Termination Date, on December 1, 2023, the Company issued an unsecured promissory note in the total principal amount of up to $1,500,000 (the “Second Promissory Note”) to the sponsor and the sponsor funded deposits into the trust account. The Second Promissory Note does not bear interest and matures upon closing of the Company’s initial Business Combination. In the event that the Company does not consummate a Business Combination, the Second Promissory Note will be repaid only from amounts remaining outside of the trust account, if any. As of December 31, 2023, an aggregate of $375,000 has been drawn under the Second Promissory Note.
Conflicts of Interest
There are potential conflicts of interest that could impact our company and our search for, and pursuit of, potential business combination opportunities, including potential conflicts associated with the interests and activities of Auldbrass Partners. These potential conflicts are discussed in more detail elsewhere in this Report and are not, and are not intended to be, a complete enumeration or explanation of all of the potential conflicts of interest that may arise.
Auldbrass Partners is an indirect investor in our sponsor. In addition, Howard Sanders, one of our directors,lead director, is currently affiliated with Auldbrass Partners as a Founding Partner and a Managing Director in its advisory business.
Auldbrass Partners manages or advises (and intends to manage and advise in the future) several investment programs. Funds managed by Auldbrass Partners may compete with us for acquisition opportunities. If these funds decide to pursue any such opportunity, we may be precluded from procuring such opportunities. In addition, investment ideas generated within Auldbrass Partners may be suitable for both us and for a current or future Auldbrass Partners fund or investee company and may be directed to such entity rather than to us. Auldbrass Partners, our management team and members of our advisory board do not have any obligation to present us with any opportunity for a potential business combination of which they become aware. See “Risk Factors”, including “Potential conflicts of interest with other businesses of Auldbrass Partners or other businesses with which our officers, directors or members of the advisory board may have fiduciary or contractual obligations could negatively impact the performance of an investment in us.”
Our sponsor, investors in our sponsor, our directors and officers and members of our advisory board are, or may in the future become, affiliated with entities that are engaged in a similar business. Our sponsor, investors in our sponsor, our directors and officers and members of our advisory board are also not prohibited from sponsoring, or otherwise becoming involved with, any other blank check companies prior to us completing our initial business combination. In addition, our officers and directors (including our advisory board members), in their other endeavors (including any affiliation or relationship they may have with Auldbrass Partners), may choose or be required to present potential business combinations to Auldbrass Partners or to third parties, before they present such opportunities to us. As a result, if any of our officers, directors or members of the advisory board becomes aware of a business combination opportunity which is suitable for an entity to which he or she has then-current fiduciary or contractual obligations, he or she will need to honor such fiduciary or contractual obligations to present such business combination opportunity to such entity, before we can pursue such opportunity. If these other entities decide to pursue any such opportunity, we may be precluded from pursuing the same. However, we do not expect these duties to materially affect our ability to complete our initial business combination. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that we renounce our interest in any business combination opportunity offered to any director or officer unless such opportunity is expressly offered to such person solely in his or her capacity as a director or officer of our company and it is an opportunity that we are able to complete on a reasonable basis. Our directors and officers are not required to commit any specified amount of time to our affairs, and, accordingly, will have conflicts of interest in allocating management time among various business activities, including identifying potential business combinations and monitoring the related due diligence. See “Risk Factors”, including those entitled “Potential conflicts of interest with other businesses of Auldbrass Partners or other businesses with which our officers, directors or members of the advisory board may have fiduciary or contractual obligations could negatively impact the performance of an investment in us”, “Certain of our officers and directors are now, and all of them may in the future become, affiliated with entities engaged in business activities similar to those intended to be conducted by us and, accordingly, may have conflicts of interest in allocating their time and determining to which entity a particular business opportunity should be presented” and “Our officers and directors will allocate their time to other businesses thereby causing conflicts of interest in their determination as to how much time to devote to our affairs. This conflict of interest could have a negative impact on our ability to complete our initial business combination.” See also the section entitled “Directors, Executive Officers, and Corporate Governance —- Conflicts of Interest.”
Similarly, if Auldbrass Partners becomes aware of a potential business combination opportunity that could be an attractive opportunity for our company, Auldbrass Partners is not under any obligation to source any potential opportunities for our initial business combination or refer any such opportunities to our company or provide any other services to our company, other than certain advisory and administrative services. Auldbrass Partners may have fiduciary and/or contractual duties to other entities and, as a result, may have a duty to offer business combination opportunities to those entities before other parties, including our company. Additionally, certain companies with which Auldbrass Partners has a relationship may enter into transactions with, provide goods or services to, or receive goods or services from an entity with which we seek to complete our initial business combination. Transactions of these types may present a conflict of interest if Auldbrass Partners may directly or indirectly receive a financial benefit as a result of such transaction. We believe that any such potential conflicts of interest of Auldbrass Partners and any of our officers or directors that are affiliated with Auldbrass Partners will be naturally mitigated by the differing nature of services that Auldbrass Partners typically provides to its clients, as compared to our activities related to pursuing an initial business combination.
In addition, each of our sponsor, directors and officers does, directly or indirectly, own, founder shares and/or private placement warrants following our initial public offering and, accordingly, may have a conflict of interest in determining whether a particular target business is an appropriate business with which to effectuate our initial business combination. Further, such directors and officers may have a conflict of interest with respect to evaluating a particular business combination if the retention or resignation of any such officers and directors was included by a target business as a condition to any agreement with respect to our initial business combination. Our sponsor may offer incentives including an indirect interest in our sponsor to Auldbrass Partners employees or others who materially contribute to the identification or execution of our initial business combination.
Information regarding performance by, or business associated with, our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board or their respective affiliates is presented for informational purposes only. Past experience or performance of our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board or their respective affiliates or related entities is not a guarantee of either (1) our ability to successfully identify and execute a transaction or (2) success with respect to any business combination that we may consummate. You should not rely on the historical record of our management team. Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board or their respective affiliates or related entities or any investment’s performance as indicative of the future performance of any investment in us or the returns we will, or are likely to, generate going forward. An investment in us is not an investment in Auldbrass Partners. See “Risk Factors —- Past performance by our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board and their respective affiliates may not be indicative of future performance of an investment in us.”
Our sponsor is Focus Impact Sponsor, LLC, a Delaware limited liability company. Our sponsor currently owns 5,000,000 shares of Class A common stock, 750,000 shares of Class B common stock and 11,200,000 private placement warrants. Our sponsor is governed by a four-member board of managers which has voting and dipositive power over the founder shares and private placement warrants held by our sponsor. Our sponsor is not “controlled” (as defined in 31 CFR 800.208) by a foreign person, such that our sponsor’s involvement in the business combination would be a “covered transaction” (as defined in 31 CFR 800.213). However, it is possible that non-U.S. persons could be involved in our business combination, which may increase the risk that our business combination becomes subject to regulatory review, including review by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (“CFIUS”), and that restrictions, limitations or conditions will be imposed by CFIUS. If our business combination with a U.S. business is subject to CFIUS review, the scope of which was expanded by the Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act of 2018 (“FIRRMA”), to include certain non-passive, non-controlling investments in sensitive U.S. businesses and certain acquisitions of real estate even with no underlying U.S. business. FIRRMA, and subsequent implementing regulations that are now in force, also subjects certain categories of investments to mandatory filings. If our potential business combination with a U.S. business falls within CFIUS’s jurisdiction, we may determine that we are required to make a mandatory filing or that we will submit a voluntary notice to CFIUS, or to proceed with a business combination without notifying CFIUS and risk CFIUS intervention, before or after closing a business combination. CFIUS may decide to block or delay our business combination, impose conditions to mitigate national security concerns with respect to such business combination or order us to divest all or a portion of a U.S. business of the combined company without first obtaining CFIUS clearance, which may limit the attractiveness of or prevent us from pursuing certain initial business combination opportunities that we believe would otherwise be beneficial to us and our shareholders. As a result, the pool of potential targets with which we could complete a business combination may be limited and we may be adversely affected in terms of competing with other special purpose acquisition companies which do not have similar foreign ownership issues. A failure to notify CFIUS of a transaction where such notification was required or otherwise warranted based on the national security considerations presented by an investment target may expose our sponsor and/or the combined company to legal penalties, costs, and/or other adverse reputational and financial effects, thus potentially diminishing the value of the combined company. In addition, CFIUS is actively pursuing transactions that were not notified to it and may ask questions regarding, or impose restrictions or mitigation on, a business combination post-closing.
Moreover, the process of government review, whether by CFIUS or otherwise, could be lengthy and we have limited time to complete our business combination. If we cannot complete a business combination by the Termination Date because the transaction is still under review or because our business combination is ultimately prohibited by CFIUS or another U.S. government entity, we may be required to liquidate. If we liquidate, our public shareholders may only receive approximately $10.20 per public share or less in certain circumstances, and our warrants will expire worthless. This will also cause you to lose the investment opportunity in a target company and the chance of realizing future gains on your investment through any price appreciation in the combined company.
Initial Business Combination
So long as our securities are then listed on Nasdaq, our initial business combination must occur with one or more target businesses that together have an aggregate fair market value of at least 80% of the assets held in the trust account (excluding the deferred underwriting commissions and taxes payable on the income earned on the trust account) at the time of the agreement to enter into the initial business combination. If our board is not able to independently determine the fair market value of the target business or businesses, we will obtain an opinion from an independent investment banking firm or an independent accounting firm with respect to the satisfaction of such criteria. Nasdaq rules also require that our initial business combination be approved by a majority of our independent directors.
We anticipate structuring our initial business combination so that the post-transaction company in which our public stockholders own shares will own or acquire 100% of the equity interests or assets of the target business or businesses. We may, however, structure our initial business combination such that the post-transaction company owns or acquires less than 100% of such interests or assets of the target business in order to meet certain objectives of the target management team or stockholders or for other reasons. However, we will only complete such business combination if the post-transaction company owns or acquires 50% or more of the outstanding voting securities of the target or otherwise acquires a controlling interest in the target sufficient for it not to be required to register as an investment company under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended, or the Investment Company Act.
Even if the post-transaction company owns or acquires 50% or more of the voting securities of the target, our stockholders prior to the business combination may collectively own a minority interest in the post-transaction company, depending on valuations ascribed to the target and us in the business combination transaction. For example, we could pursue a transaction in which we issue a substantial number of new shares in exchange for all of the outstanding capital stock of a target. In this case, we would acquire a 100% controlling interest in the target. However, as a result of the issuance of a substantial number of new shares, our stockholders immediately prior to our initial business combination could own less than a majority of our outstanding shares subsequent to our initial business combination. If less than 100% of the equity interests or assets of a target business or businesses are owned or acquired by the post- transactionpost-transaction company, the portion of such business or businesses that is owned or acquired is what will be valued for purposes of the 80% of net assets test. If the business combination involves more than one target business, the 80% of net assets test will be based on the aggregate value of all of the target businesses and we will treat the target businesses together as the initial business combination for purposes of a tender offer or for seeking stockholder approval, as applicable. In addition, we have agreed not to enter into a definitive agreement regarding an initial business combination without the prior consent of our sponsor. If our securities are not then listed on Nasdaq for whatever reason, we would no longer be required to meet the foregoing 80% of net asset test.
Our Management Team
Members of our management team are not obligated to devote any specific number of hours to our matters but they intend to devote as much of their time as they deem necessary to our affairs until we have completed our initial business combination. The amount of time that any member of our management team will devote in any time period will vary based on whether a target business has been selected for our initial business combination and the current stage of the business combination process.
We believe our management team’s operating and transaction experience and network of relationships with investment banks, private equity firms, professional advisors and senior industrial executives provide us with a substantial number of potential business combination targets. Over the course of their careers, the members of our management team have developed a broad network of contacts and corporate relationships around the world. This network has grown through the activities of our management team sourcing, acquiring and financing businesses, our management team’s relationships with sellers, financing sources and target management teams. Our management team is also highly experienced in executing transactions under varying economic and financial market conditions. See the section of this Report entitled “Directors, Executive Officers and Corporate Governance” for a more complete description of our management team’s experience.
Status as a Public Company
We believe our structure will make us an attractive business combination partner to target businesses. As an existing public company, we offer a target business an alternative to the traditional initial public offering through a merger or other business combination. In this situation, the owners of the target business would exchange their shares of stock in the target business for shares of our stock or for a combination of shares of our stock and cash, allowing us to tailor the consideration to the specific needs of the sellers. Although there are various costs and obligations associated with being a public company, we believe certain target businesses will find this method a more certain and cost effective method to becoming a public company than the typical initial public offering. In a typical initial public offering, there are additional expenses incurred in marketing, road show and public reporting efforts that may not be present to the same extent in connection with a business combination with us.
Furthermore, once a proposed business combination is completed, the target business will have effectively become public, whereas an initial public offering is always subject to the underwriters’ ability to complete the offering, as well as general market conditions, which could delay or prevent the offering from occurring or could have negative valuation consequences. Once public, we believe the target business would then have greater access to capital and an additional means of providing management incentives consistent with stockholders’ interests. It can offer further benefits by augmenting a company’s profile among potential new customers and vendors and aid in attracting talented employees.
We are an “emerging growth company,” as defined in Section 2(a) of the Securities Act, as modified by the JOBS Act. As such, we are eligible to take advantage of certain exemptions from various reporting requirements that are applicable to other public companies that are not emerging growth companies including, but not limited to, not being required to comply with the auditor attestation requirements of Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, reduced disclosure obligations regarding executive compensation in our periodic reports and proxy statements, and exemptions from the requirements of holding a non-binding advisory vote on executive compensation and stockholder approval of any golden parachute payments not previously approved. If some investors find our securities less attractive as a result, there may be a less active trading market for our securities and the prices of our securities may be more volatile.
In addition, Section 107 of the JOBS Act also provides that an emerging growth company can take advantage of the extended transition period provided in Section 7(a)(2)(B) of the Securities Act for complying with new or revised accounting standards. In other words, an emerging growth company can delay the adoption of certain accounting standards until those standards would otherwise apply to private companies. We intend to take advantage of the benefits of this extended transition period.
We will remain an emerging growth company until the earlier of (1) the last day of the fiscal year (a) following the fifth anniversary of the completion of our initial public offering, (b) in which we have total annual gross revenue of at least $1.07$1.235 billion, or (c) in which we are deemed to be a large accelerated filer, which means the market value of our Class A common stock that is held by non-affiliates exceeds $700 million as of the end of the prior fiscal year’s second fiscal quarter, and (2) the date on which we have issued more than $1.0 billion in non-convertible debt securities during the prior three-year period.
Financial Position
With funds available for a business combination initially in the amount of $225,950,000$62,736,405 as of December 31, 2023, after payment of $8,650,000 of deferred underwriting fees,taking into account redemptions in each caseconnection with the Second Extension Meeting and before fees and expenses associated with our initial business combination, we offer a target business a variety of options such as creating a liquidity event for its owners, providing access to the expertise of our management team, providing capital for the potential growth and expansion of its operations or strengthening its balance sheet by reducing its debt or leverage ratio. Because we are able to complete our business combination using our cash, debt or equity securities, or a combination of the foregoing, we have the flexibility to use the most efficient combination that will allow us to tailor the consideration to be paid to the target business to fit its needs and desires. However, we have not taken any steps to secure third party financing and there can be no assurance it will be available to us.
Effecting our Initial Business Combination
We are not presently engaged in, and we will not engage in, any operations for an indefinite period of time following our initial public offering. We intend to effectuate our initial business combination using cash from the proceeds of our initial public offering and the private placement of the private placement warrants, our capital stock, debt or a combination of these as the consideration to be paid in our initial business combination. We may seek to complete our initial business combination with a company or business that may be financially unstable or in its early stages of development or growth, which would subject us to the numerous risks inherent in such companies and businesses.
If our initial business combination is paid for using equity or debt securities, or not all of the funds released from the trust account are used for payment of the consideration in connection with our business combination or used for redemptions of purchases of our Class A common stock, we may apply the balance of the cash released to us from the trust account for general corporate purposes, including for maintenance or expansion of operations of the post- transactionpost-transaction company, the payment of principal or interest due on indebtedness incurred in completing our initial business combination, to fund the purchase of other companies or for working capital.
We currently do not have any specific transaction under consideration with a target business with which to consummate our initial business combination. We may seek to raise additional funds through a private offering of debt or equity securities in connection with the completion of our initial business combination, and we may effectuate our initial business combination using the proceeds of such offering rather than using the amounts held in the trust account. Subject to compliance with applicable securities laws, we would expect to complete such financing only simultaneously with the completion of our business combination. In the case of an initial business combination funded with assets other than the trust account assets, our tender offer documents or proxy materials disclosing the business combination would disclose the terms of the financing and, only if required by law, we would seek stockholder approval of such financing. There are no prohibitions on our ability to raise funds privately or through loans in connection with our initial business combination. At this time, we are not a party to any arrangement or understanding with any third party with respect to raising any additional funds through the sale of securities or otherwise.
Sources of Target Businesses
We anticipate that target business candidates will be brought to our attention from various unaffiliated sources, including investment market participants, private equity groups, investment banking firms, consultants, accounting firms and large business enterprises. Target businesses may be brought to our attention by such unaffiliated sources as a result of being solicited by us through calls or mailings. These sources may also introduce us to target businesses in which they think we may be interested on an unsolicited basis, since many of these sources will have read this Report and know what types of businesses we are targeting. Our officers and directors, as well as their affiliates, may also bring to our attention target business candidates that they become aware of through their business contacts as a result of formal or informal inquiries or discussions they may have, as well as attending trade shows or conventions. In addition, we expect to receive a number of proprietary deal flow opportunities that would not otherwise necessarily be available to us as a result of the business relationships of our officers and directors. WhileIf we do not presently anticipate engagingengage the services of professional firms or other individuals that specialize in business acquisitions on any formal basis, we may engage these firms or other individuals in the future, in which event we may pay a finder’s fee, consulting fee or other compensation to be determined in an arm’s length negotiation based on the terms of the transaction. We will engage a finder only to the extent our management determines that the use of a finder may bring opportunities to us that may not otherwise be available to us or if finders approach us on an unsolicited basis with a potential transaction that our management determines is in our best interest to pursue.
Payment of finder’s fees is customarily tied to completion of a transaction, in which case any such fee will be paid out of the funds held in the trust account. In no event, however, will our sponsor or any of our existing officers or directors, members of our advisory board or any entity with which they are affiliated, be paid any finder’s fee, consulting fee or other compensation prior to, or for any services they render in order to effectuate, the completion of our initial business combination (regardless of the type of transaction that it is). We have agreed to pay an affiliate of our sponsor a total of $10,000 per month for office space, utilities and secretarial and administrative support and to reimburse our sponsor for any out-of-pocket expenses related to identifying, investigating and completing an initial business combination. Some of our officers and directors may enter into employment or consulting agreements with the post-transaction company following our initial business combination. The presence or absence of any such fees or arrangements will not be used as a criterion in our selection process of an acquisition candidate.
We are not prohibited from pursuing an initial business combination with a company that is affiliated with or related to Auldbrass Partners, our sponsor, officers, directors or members of our advisory board. In the event we seek to complete our initial business combination with a company that is affiliated with or related to any of Auldbrass Partners, our sponsor, officers, directors or members of our advisory board, we, or a committee of independent and disinterested directors, will obtain an opinion from an independent investment banking firm or another independent entity that commonly renders valuation opinions that such initial business combination is fair to our company from a financial point of view. We are not required to obtain such an opinion in any other context.
As more fully discussed in the section of this Report entitled “Management —- Conflicts of Interest,” if any of our officers or directors becomes aware of a business combination opportunity that falls within the line of business of any entity to which he or she has pre-existing fiduciary or contractual obligations, he or she may be required to present such business combination opportunity to such entity prior to presenting such business combination opportunity to us. Our officers and directors currently have certain relevant fiduciary duties or contractual obligations that may take priority over their duties to us.
Selection of a Target Business and Structuring of Our Initial Business Combination
Our initial business combination must occur with one or more target businesses that together have an aggregate fair market value of at least 80% of our assets held in the trust account (excluding the deferred underwriting commissions and taxes payable on the income earned on the trust account) at the time of the agreement to enter into the initial business combination. The fair market value of the target or targets will be determined by our board of directors based upon one or more standards generally accepted by the financial community, such as discounted cash flow valuation or value of comparable businesses. If our board is not able to independently determine the fair market value of the target business or businesses, we will obtain an opinion from an independent investment banking firm or from an independent accounting firm, with respect to the satisfaction of such criteria. We do not intend to purchase multiple businesses in unrelated industries in conjunction with our initial business combination. Subject to this requirement, our management will have virtually unrestricted flexibility in identifying and selecting one or more prospective target businesses, although we will not be permitted to effectuate our initial business combination with another blank check company or a similar company with nominal operations.
In any case, we will only complete an initial business combination in which we own or acquire 50% or more of the outstanding voting securities of the target or otherwise acquire a controlling interest in the target sufficient for it not to be required to register as an investment company under the Investment Company Act. If we own or acquire less than 100% of the equity interests or assets of a target business or businesses, the portion of such business or businesses that are owned or acquired by the post-transaction company is what will be valued for purposes of the 80% of net assets test. There is no basis for investors in our initial public offering to evaluate the possible merits or risks of any target business with which we may ultimately complete our business combination.
To the extent we effect our business combination with a company or business that may be financially unstable or in its early stages of development or growth we may be affected by numerous risks inherent in such company or business. Although our management will endeavor to evaluate the risks inherent in a particular target business, we cannot assure you that we will properly ascertain or assess all significant risk factors.
In evaluating a prospective target business, we expect to conduct a thorough due diligence review, which will encompass, among other things, meetings with incumbent management and employees, document reviews, interviews of customers and suppliers, inspection of facilities, as well as a review of financial and other information that will be made available to us.
The time required to select and evaluate a target business and to structure and complete our initial business combination, and the costs associated with this process, are not currently ascertainable with any degree of certainty. Any costs incurred with respect to the identification and evaluation of, and negotiation with, a prospective target business with which our business combination is not ultimately completed will result in our incurring losses and will reduce the funds we can use to complete another business combination. In addition, we have agreed not to enter into a definitive agreement regarding an initial business combination without the prior consent of our sponsor.
Lack of Business Diversification
For an indefinite period of time after the completion of our initial business combination, the prospects for our success may depend entirely on the future performance of a single business. Unlike other entities that have the resources to complete business combinations with multiple entities in one or several industries, it is probable that we will not have the resources to diversify our operations and mitigate the risks of being in a single line of business. By completing our business combination with only a single business, our lack of diversification may:
subject us to negative economic, competitive and regulatory developments, any or all of which may have a substantial adverse impact on the particular industry in which we operate after our initial business combination; and
cause us to depend on the marketing and sale of a single product or limited number of products or services.
Limited Ability to Evaluate the Target’s Management Team
Although we intend to closely scrutinize the management of a prospective target business when evaluating the desirability of effecting our business combination with that business, our assessment of the target business’ management may not prove to be correct. In addition, the future management may not have the necessary skills, qualifications or abilities to manage a public company. Furthermore, the future role of members of our management team, if any, in the target business cannot presently be stated with any certainty. While it is possible that one or more of our directors will remain associated in some capacity with us following our business combination, it is unlikely that any of them will devote their full efforts to our affairs subsequent to our business combination. Moreover, we cannot assure you that members of our management team will have significant experience or knowledge relating to the operations of the particular target business.
We cannot assure you that any of our key personnel will remain in senior management or advisory positions with the combined company. The determination as to whether any of our key personnel will remain with the combined company will be made at the time of our initial business combination.
Following a business combination, we may seek to recruit additional managers to supplement the incumbent management of the target business. We cannot assure you that we will have the ability to recruit additional managers, or that those additional managers will have the requisite skills, knowledge or experience necessary to enhance the incumbent management.
Stockholders May Not Have the Ability to Approve Our Initial Business Combination
We may conduct redemptions without a stockholder vote pursuant to the tender offer rules of the SEC, subject to the provisions of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation and bylaws. However, we will seek stockholder approval if it is required by law or applicable stock exchange rule, or we may decide to seek stockholder approval for business or other legal reasons.
Presented in the table below is a graphic explanation of the types of initial business combinations we may consider and whether stockholder approval is currently required under Delaware law for each such transaction.
| | | Whether Stockholder Approval is Required Required
|
Purchase of assets | | | No |
Purchase of stock of target not involving a merger with the companyCompany | | | No |
Merger of target into a subsidiary of the companyCompany | | | No |
Merger of the companyCompany with a target
| | | Yes |
Under Nasdaq’s listing rules, stockholder approval would be required for our initial business combination if, for example:
we issue (other than in a public offering) shares of Class A common stock that will be equal to or in excess of 20% of the number of shares of our Class A common stock then outstanding;
any of our directors, officers or substantial stockholders (as defined by the Nasdaq rules) has a 5% or greater interest (or such persons collectively have a 10% or greater interest), directly or indirectly, in the target business or assets to be acquired or otherwise and the present or potential issuance of common stock could result in an increase in outstanding shares of common stock or voting power of 5% or more; or
the issuance or potential issuance of common stock will result in our undergoing a change of control.
The decision as to whether we will seek stockholder approval of a proposed business combination in those instances in which stockholder approval is not required by law or applicable stock exchange rules will be made by us, solely in our discretion, and will be based on business and legal reasons, which include a variety of factors, including, but not limited to:
the timing of the transaction, including in the event we determine stockholder approval would require additional time and there is either not enough time to seek stockholder approval or doing so would place the company at a disadvantage in the transaction or result in other additional burdens on the company;
the expected cost of holding a stockholder vote;
the risk that the stockholders would fail to approve the proposed business combination;
other time and budget constraints of the company; and
additional legal complexities of a proposed business combination that would be time-consuming and burdensome to present to stockholders.
Permitted Purchases of Our Securities
In the event we seek stockholder approval of our business combination and we do not conduct redemptions in connection with our business combination pursuant to the tender offer rules, our sponsor, directors, officers or their affiliates may purchase shares in privately negotiated transactions or in the open market either prior to or following the completion of our initial business combination. However, they have no current commitments, plans or intentions to engage in such transactions and have not formulated any terms or conditions for any such transactions. None of the funds in the trust account will be used to purchase shares in such transactions. They will be restricted from making any such purchases when they are in possession of any material non-public information not disclosed to the seller or if such purchases are prohibited by Regulation M under the Exchange Act. Such a purchase may include a contractual acknowledgement that such stockholder, although still the record holder of our shares is no longer the beneficial owner thereof and therefore agrees not to exercise its redemption rights. Subsequent to the consummation of our initial public offering, we will adopt an insider trading policy which will require insiders to refrain from purchasing shares during certain blackout periods and when they are in possession of any material non-public information and to clear all trades with our legal counsel prior to execution. We cannot currently determine whether our insiders will make such purchases pursuant to a Rule 10b5-110b5‑1 plan, as such purchases will be dependent upon several factors, including but not limited to, the timing and size of such purchases. Depending on such circumstances, our insiders may either make such purchases pursuant to a Rule 10b5-110b5‑1 plan or determine that such a plan is not necessary.
In the event that our sponsor, directors, officers or their affiliates purchase shares in privately negotiated transactions from public stockholders who have already elected to exercise their redemption rights, such selling stockholders would be required to revoke their prior elections to redeem their shares. We do not currently anticipate that such purchases, if any, would constitute a tender offer subject to the tender offer rules under the Exchange Act or a going-private transaction subject to the going-private rules under the Exchange Act; however, if the purchasers determine at the time of any such purchases that the purchases are subject to such rules, the purchasers will comply with such rules.
The purpose of such purchases would be to (i) vote such shares in favor of the business combination and thereby increase the likelihood of obtaining stockholder approval of the business combination or (ii) to satisfy a closing condition in an agreement with a target that requires us to have a minimum net worth or a certain amount of cash at the closing of our business combination, where it appears that such requirement would otherwise not be met. This may result in the completion of our business combination that may not otherwise have been possible.
In addition, if such purchases are made, the public “float” of our common stock may be reduced and the number of beneficial holders of our securities may be reduced, which may make it difficult to maintain or obtain the quotation, listing or trading of our securities on a national securities exchange.
Our sponsor, officers, directors and/or their affiliates anticipate that they may identify the stockholders with whom our sponsor, officers, directors or their affiliates may pursue privately negotiated purchases by either the stockholders contacting us directly or by our receipt of redemption requests submitted by stockholders following our mailing of proxy materials in connection with our initial business combination. To the extent that our sponsor, officers, directors or their affiliates enter into a private purchase, they would identify and contact only potential selling stockholders who have expressed their election to redeem their shares for a pro rata share of the trust account or vote against the business combination. Our sponsor, officers, directors or their affiliates will only purchase shares if such purchases comply with Regulation M under the Exchange Act and the other federal securities laws.
Any purchases by our sponsor, officers, directors and/or their affiliates who are affiliated purchasers under Rule 10b-1810b‑18 under the Exchange Act will only be made to the extent such purchases are able to be made in compliance with Rule 10b-18,10b‑18, which is a safe harbor from liability for manipulation under Section 9(a)(2) and Rule 10b-510b‑5 of the Exchange Act. Rule 10b-1810b‑18 has certain technical requirements that must be complied with in order for the safe harbor to be available to the purchaser. Our sponsor, officers, directors and/or their affiliates will not make purchases of common stock if the purchases would violate Section 9(a)(2) or Rule 10b-510b‑5 of the Exchange Act.
Redemption Rights for Public Stockholders Upon Completion of Our Initial Business Combination
We will provide our public stockholders with the opportunity to redeem all or a portion of their shares of Class A common stock upon the completion of our initial business combination at a per-share price, payable in cash, equal to the aggregate amount then on deposit in the trust account as of two business days prior to the consummation of the initial business combination including interest earned on the funds held in the trust account and not previously released to us to pay our franchise and income taxes, divided by the number of then outstanding public shares, subject to the limitations described herein. The amount in the trust account, without taking into account interest earned on the trust account, is initially anticipated to be approximately $10.20 per public share. The per-share amount we will distribute to investors who properly redeem their shares will not be reduced by the deferred underwriting commissions we will pay to the underwriters. The redemption rights will include the requirement that a beneficial holder must identify itself in order to validly redeem its shares. Our sponsor, officers and directors have entered into a letter agreement with us, pursuant to which they have agreed (i) to waive their redemption rights with respect to any founder shares and public shares held by them in connection with the completion of our initial business combination and a stockholder vote to approve an amendment to our amended and restated certificate of incorporation (A) that would modify the substance or timing of our obligation to provide holders of shares of Class A common stock the right to have their shares redeemed in connection with our initial business combination or to redeem 100% of our public shares if we do not complete our initial business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offeringTermination Date or (B) with respect to any other provision relating to the rights of holders of our Class A commons stock and (ii) to waive their rights to liquidating distributions from the trust account with respect to any founder shares they hold if we fail to consummate an initial business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offeringTermination Date (although they will be entitled to liquidating distributions from the trust account with respect to any public shares they hold if we fail to complete our initial business combination within the prescribed time frame).
Manner of Conducting Redemptions
We will provide our public stockholders with the opportunity to redeem all or a portion of their shares of Class A common stock upon the completion of our initial business combination either (i) in connection with a stockholder meeting called to approve the business combination or (ii) by means of a tender offer. The decision as to whether we will seek stockholder approval of a proposed business combination or conduct a tender offer will be made by us, solely in our discretion, and will be based on a variety of factors described above “—Stockholders May Not Have the Ability to Approve Our Initial Business Combination,” such as the timing of the transaction and whether the terms of the transaction would require us to seek stockholder approval under the law or stock exchange listing requirement. Asset acquisitions and stock purchases would not typically require stockholder approval while direct mergers with our company where we do not survive and any transactions where we issue more than 20% of our outstanding common stock or seek to amend our amended and restated certificate of incorporation would require stockholder approval. If we structure a business combination transaction with a target company in a manner that requires stockholder approval, we will not have discretion as to whether to seek a stockholder vote to approve the proposed business combination. We intend to conduct redemptions without a stockholder vote pursuant to the tender offer rules of the SEC unless stockholder approval is required by law or stock exchange listing requirements or we choose to seek stockholder approval for business or other legal reasons.
If a stockholder vote is not required and we do not decide to hold a stockholder vote for business or other legal reasons, we will, pursuant to our amended and restated certificate of incorporation:
conduct the redemptions pursuant to Rule 13e-4143e‑4 and Regulation 14E of the Exchange Act, which regulate issuer tender offers; and
file tender offer documents with the SEC prior to completing our initial business combination which contain substantially the same financial and other information about the initial business combination and the redemption rights as is required under Regulation 14A of the Exchange Act, which regulates the solicitation of proxies.
Upon the public announcement of our business combination, we or our sponsor will terminate any plan established in accordance with Rule 10b5-110b5‑1 to purchase shares of our Class A common stock in the open market if we elect to redeem our public shares through a tender offer, to comply with Rule 14e-514e‑5 under the Exchange Act.
In the event we conduct redemptions pursuant to the tender offer rules, our offer to redeem will remain open for at least 20 business days, in accordance with Rule 14e-1(a) under the Exchange Act, and we will not be permitted to complete our initial business combination until the expiration of the tender offer period. In addition, the tender offer will be conditioned on public stockholders not tendering more than a specified number of public shares which are not purchased by our sponsor, which number will be based on the requirement that we may not redeem public shares in an amount that would cause our net tangible assets to be less than $5,000,001 or any greater net tangible asset or cash requirement which may be contained in the agreement relating to our initial business combination. If public stockholders tender more shares than we have offered to purchase, we will withdraw the tender offer and not complete the initial business combination.
If, however, stockholder approval of the transaction is required by law or stock exchange listing requirement, or we decide to obtain stockholder approval for business or other legal reasons, we will, pursuant to our amended and restated certificate of incorporation:
conduct the redemptions in conjunction with a proxy solicitation pursuant to Regulation 14A of the Exchange Act, which regulates the solicitation of proxies, and not pursuant to the tender offer rules; and
file proxy materials with the SEC.
In the event that we seek stockholder approval of our initial business combination, we will distribute proxy materials and, in connection therewith, provide our public stockholders with the redemption rights described above upon completion of the initial business combination.
If we seek stockholder approval, we will complete our initial business combination only if a majority of the outstanding shares of common stock voted are voted in favor of the business combination. A quorum for such meeting will consist of the holders present in person or by proxy of shares of outstanding capital stock of the companyCompany representing a majority of the voting power of all outstanding shares of capital stock of the companyCompany entitled to vote at such meeting. Our initial stockholders will count toward this quorum and have agreed to vote their founder shares and any public shares purchased during or after our initial public offering in favor of our initial business combination. For purposes of seeking approval of the majority of our outstanding shares of common stock voted, non-votes will have no effect on the approval of our initial business combination once a quorum is obtained. Following redemptions in connection with the Second Extension Meeting, the sponsor holds approximately 77% of the outstanding shares of the Company. As a result, in addition to our initial stockholders’ founder shares, we would need 8,625,001, or 37.5%, of the 23,000,000no additional public shares sold in our initial public offering would need to be voted in favor of a transaction (assuming all outstanding shares are voted) in order to have our initial business combination approved. We will give at least 10 days prior written notice of any such meeting, if required, at which a vote shall be taken to approve our initial business combination. These quorum and voting thresholds, and the voting agreements of our initial stockholders, may make it more likely that we will consummate our initial business combination. Each public stockholder may elect to redeem its public shares irrespective of whether they vote for or against the proposed transaction.
Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that inIn no event will we redeem our public shares in an amount that would cause our net tangible assets to be less than $5,000,001 or any greater net tangible asset or cash requirement which may be contained in the agreement relating to our initial business combination. For example, the proposed business combination may require: (i) cash consideration to be paid to the target or its owners; (ii) cash to be transferred to the target for working capital or other general corporate purposes; or (iii) the retention of cash to satisfy other conditions in accordance with the terms of the proposed business combination. In the event the aggregate cash consideration we would be required to pay for all shares of Class A common stock that are validly submitted for redemption plus any amount required to satisfy cash conditions pursuant to the terms of the proposed business combination exceed the aggregate amount of cash available to us, we will not complete the business combination or redeem any shares, and all shares of Class A common stock submitted for redemption will be returned to the holders thereof.
Limitation on Redemption Upon Completion of Our Initial Business Combination if We Seek Stockholder Approval
Notwithstanding the foregoing, if we seek stockholder approval of our initial business combination and we do not conduct redemptions in connection with our business combination pursuant to the tender offer rules, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that a public stockholder, together with any affiliate of such stockholder or any other person with whom such stockholder is acting in concert or as a “group” (as defined under Section 13 of the Exchange Act), will be restricted from seeking redemption rights with respect to more than an aggregate of 15% of the shares sold in our initial public offering, which we refer to as the “Excess“Excess Shares,” without our prior consent. We believe this restriction will discourage stockholders from accumulating large blocks of shares, and subsequent attempts by such holders to use their ability to exercise their redemption rights against a proposed business combination as a means to force us or our management to purchase their shares at a significant premium to the then-current market price or on other undesirable terms. Absent this provision, a public stockholder holding more than an aggregate of 15% of the shares sold in our initial public offering could threaten to exercise its redemption rights if such holder’s shares are not purchased by us or our management at a premium to the then-current market price or on other undesirable terms. By limiting our stockholders’ ability to redeem no more than 15% of the shares sold in our initial public offering, we believe we will limit the ability of a small group of stockholders to unreasonably attempt to block our ability to complete our business combination, particularly in connection with a business combination with a target that requires as a closing condition that we have a minimum net worth or a certain amount of cash. However, we would not be restricting our stockholders’ ability to vote all of their shares (including Excess Shares) for or against our business combination.
Tendering Stock Certificates in Connection with a Tender Offer or Redemption Rights
As described above, we intend to require our public stockholders seeking to exercise their redemption rights, whether they are record holders or hold their shares in “street name,” to, at the holder’s option, either deliver their stock certificates to our transfer agent or deliver their shares to our transfer agent electronically using The Depository Trust Company’s DWAC (Deposit/Withdrawal At Custodian) system, prior to the date set forth in the proxy materials or tender offer documents, as applicable. In the case of proxy materials, this date may be up to two business days prior to the date on which the vote on the proposal to approve the initial business combination is initially to be held. In addition, if we conduct redemptions in connection with a stockholder vote, we intend to require a public stockholder seeking redemption of its public shares to also submit a written request for redemption to our transfer agent two business days prior to the initially scheduled vote in which the name and other identifying information of the beneficial owner of such shares is included. The proxy materials or tender offer documents, as applicable, that we will furnish to holders of our public shares in connection with our initial business combination will indicate whether we are requiring public stockholders to satisfy such delivery requirements. Accordingly, a public stockholder would have up to two business days prior to the initially scheduled vote on the initial business combination if we distribute proxy materials, or from the time we send out our tender offer materials until the close of the tender offer period, as applicable, to submit or tender its shares if it wishes to seek to exercise its redemption rights. In the event that a stockholder fails to comply with these or any other procedures disclosed in the proxy or tender offer materials, as applicable, its shares may not be redeemed. Given the relatively short exercise period, it is advisable for stockholders to use electronic delivery of their public shares.
There is a nominal cost associated with the above-referenced process and the act of certificating the shares or delivering them through the DWAC system. The transfer agent will typically charge the broker submitting or tendering shares a fee of approximately $80.00 and it would be up to the broker whether or not to pass this cost on to the redeeming holder. However, this fee would be incurred regardless of whether or not we require holders seeking to exercise redemption rights to submit or tender their shares. The need to deliver shares is a requirement of exercising redemption rights regardless of the timing of when such delivery must be effectuated.
Any request to redeem such shares, once made, may be withdrawn at any time up to the date set forth in the proxy materials or tender offer documents, as applicable. Furthermore, if a holder of a public share delivered its certificate in connection with an election of redemption rights and subsequently decides prior to the applicable date not to elect to exercise such rights, such holder may simply request that the transfer agent return the certificate (physically or electronically). It is anticipated that the funds to be distributed to holders of our public shares electing to redeem their shares will be distributed promptly after the completion of our initial business combination.
If our initial business combination is not approved or completed for any reason, then our public stockholders who elected to exercise their redemption rights would not be entitled to redeem their shares for the applicable pro rata share of the trust account. In such case, we will promptly return any certificates delivered by public holders who elected to redeem their shares.
If our initial proposed initial business combination is not completed, we may continue to try to complete an initial business combination with a different target until 18 months from the closing of our initial public offering.Termination Date.
Redemption of Public Shares and Liquidation if no Initial Business Combination
Our sponsor, officers and directors have agreed that we will have only 18 months fromuntil the closing of our initial public offeringTermination Date to complete our initial business combination. If we are unable to complete our business combination within such 18-month period,by the Termination Date, we will: (i) cease all operations except for the purpose of winding up; (ii) as promptly as reasonably possible but not more than ten business days thereafter, redeem the public shares, at a per-share price, payable in cash, equal to the aggregate amount then on deposit in the trust account including interest earned on the funds held in the trust account and not previously released to us to pay our franchise and income taxes (less up to $100,000 of interest to pay dissolution expenses), divided by the number of then outstanding public shares, which redemption will completely extinguish public stockholders’ rights as stockholders (including the right to receive further liquidating distributions, if any), subject to applicable law; and (iii) as promptly as reasonably possible following such redemption, subject to the approval of our remaining stockholders and our board of directors, dissolve and liquidate, subject in each case to our obligations under Delaware law to provide for claims of creditors and the requirements of other applicable law. There will be no redemption rights or liquidating distributions with respect to our warrants, which will expire worthless if we fail to complete our business combination withinby the 18-month time period.Termination Date.
Our sponsor officers and directors have entered into a letter agreement with us, pursuant to which they have waived their rights to liquidating distributions from the trust account with respect to any founder shares held by them if we fail to complete our initial business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offering.Termination Date. However, if our initial stockholders acquire public shares in or after our initial public offering, they will be entitled to liquidating distributions from the trust account with respect to such public shares if we fail to complete our initial business combination withinby the allotted 24- month time period.Termination Date.
Our sponsor, officers and directors have agreed, pursuant to a written agreement with us, that they will not propose any amendment to our amended and restated certificate of incorporation that would modify the substance or timing of our obligation to provide holders of our Class A common stock the right to have their shares redeemed in connection with our initial business combination or to redeem 100% of our public shares if we do not complete our initial business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offeringTermination Date or with respect to any other provision relating to the rights of holders of our Class A common stock unless we provide our public stockholders with the opportunity to redeem their shares of Class A common stock upon approval of any such amendment at a per-share price, payable in cash, equal to the aggregate amount then on deposit in the trust account, including interest earned on the funds held in the trust account and not previously released to the companyCompany to pay franchise and income taxes, if any, divided by the number of the then outstanding public shares. However, we may not redeem our public shares in an amount that would cause our net tangible assets to be less than $5,000,001 upon consummation of our initial business combination.
We expect that all costs and expenses associated with implementing our plan of dissolution, as well as payments to any creditors, will be funded from amounts remaining out of the approximately $1,900,000 of proceeds$224,394 held outside the trust account (as of December 31, 2023), although we cannot assure you that there will be sufficient funds for such purpose. However, if those funds are not sufficient to cover the costs and expenses associated with implementing our plan of dissolution, to the extent that there is any interest accrued in the trust account not required to pay our franchise and income taxes on interest income earned on the trust account balance, we may request the trustee to release to us an additional amount of up to $100,000 of such accrued interest to pay those costs and expenses.
If we were to expend all of the net proceeds of our initial public offering and the sale of the private placement warrants, other than the proceeds deposited in the trust account, and without taking into account interest, if any, earned on the trust account, the per-share redemption amount received by stockholders upon our dissolution would be approximately $10.20. The proceeds deposited in the trust account could, however, become subject to the claims of our creditors which would have higher priority than the claims of our public stockholders. We cannot assure you that the actual per- shareper-share redemption amount received by stockholders will not be substantially less than $10.20. Under Section 281(b) of the DGCL, our plan of dissolution must provide for all claims against us to be paid in full or make provision for payments to be made in full, as applicable, if there are sufficient assets. These claims must be paid or provided for before we make any distribution of our remaining assets to our stockholders. While we intend to pay such amounts, if any, we cannot assure you that we will have funds sufficient to pay or provide for all creditors’ claims.
Although we will seek to have all vendors, service providers (other than our independent registered public accounting firm), prospective target businesses or other entities with which we do business execute agreements with us waiving any right, title, interest or claim of any kind in or to any monies held in the trust account for the benefit of our public stockholders, there is no guarantee that they will execute such agreements or even if they execute such agreements that they would be prevented from bringing claims against the trust account including but not limited to fraudulent inducement, breach of fiduciary responsibility or other similar claims, as well as claims challenging the enforceability of the waiver, in each case in order to gain an advantage with respect to a claim against our assets, including the funds held in the trust account. If any third party refuses to execute an agreement waiving such claims to the monies held in the trust account, our management will perform an analysis of the alternatives available to it and will only enter into an agreement with a third party that has not executed a waiver if management believes that such third party’s engagement would be significantly more beneficial to us than any alternative. Examples of possible instances where we may engage a third party that refuses to execute a waiver include the engagement of a third party consultant whose particular expertise or skills are believed by management to be significantly superior to those of other consultants that would agree to execute a waiver or in cases where management is unable to find a service provider willing to execute a waiver.
In addition, there is no guarantee that such entities will agree to waive any claims they may have in the future as a result of, or arising out of, any negotiations, contracts or agreements with us and will not seek recourse against the trust account for any reason. Our sponsor has agreed that it will be liable to us if and to the extent any claims by a vendor for services rendered or products sold to us, or a prospective target business with which we have discussed entering into a transaction agreement, reduce the amount of funds in the trust account to below (i) $10.20 per public share or (ii) such lesser amount per public share held in the trust account as of the date of the liquidation of the trust account, due to reductions in value of the trust assets, in each case net of the interest that may be withdrawn to pay our tax obligations, except as to any claims by a third party who executed a waiver of any and all rights to seek access to the trust account and except as to any claims under our indemnity of the underwriters of our initial public offering against certain liabilities, including liabilities under the Securities Act. In the event that an executed waiver is deemed to be unenforceable against a third party, then our sponsor will not be responsible to the extent of any liability for such third party claims. We have not independently verified whether our sponsor has sufficient funds to satisfy its indemnity obligations and believe that our sponsor’s only assets are securities of our company. We have not asked our sponsor to reserve for such indemnification obligations. Therefore, we cannot assure you that our sponsor would be able to satisfy those obligations. As a result, if any such claims were successfully made against the trust account, the funds available for our initial business combination and redemptions could be reduced to less than $10.20 per public share. In such event, we may not be able to complete our initial business combination, and you would receive such lesser amount per share in connection with any redemption of your public shares. None of our officers will indemnify us for claims by third parties including, without limitation, claims by vendors and prospective target businesses.
In the event that the proceeds in the trust account are reduced below (i) $10.20 per public share or (ii) such lesser amount per public share held in the trust account as of the date of the liquidation of the trust account, due to reductions in value of the trust assets, in each case net of the amount of interest which may be withdrawn to pay our tax obligations, and our sponsor asserts that it is unable to satisfy its indemnification obligations or that it has no indemnification obligations related to a particular claim, our independent directors would determine whether to take legal action against our sponsor to enforce its indemnification obligations. While we currently expect that our independent directors would take legal action on our behalf against our sponsor to enforce its indemnification obligations to us, it is possible that our independent directors in exercising their business judgment may choose not to do so if, for example, the cost of such legal action is deemed by the independent directors to be too high relative to the amount recoverable or if the independent directors determine that a favorable outcome is not likely. We have not asked our sponsor to reserve for such indemnification obligations and we cannot assure you that our sponsor would be able to satisfy those obligations. Accordingly, we cannot assure you that due to claims of creditors the actual value of the per-share redemption price will not be less than $10.20 per public share.
We will seek to reduce the possibility that our sponsor will have to indemnify the trust account due to claims of creditors by endeavoring to have all vendors, service providers (other than our independent registered public accounting firm), prospective target businesses or other entities with which we do business execute agreements with us waiving any right, title, interest or claim of any kind in or to monies held in the trust account. Our sponsor will also not be liable as to any claims under our indemnity of the underwriters of our initial public offering against certain liabilities, including liabilities under the Securities Act. We willAs of December 31, 2023, we have access to up to approximately $1,900,000$224,394 from the proceeds of our initial public offering and borrowings from related parties with which to pay any such potential claims (including costs and expenses incurred in connection with our liquidation, currently estimated to be no more than approximately $100,000). In the event that we liquidate and it is subsequently determined that the reserve for claims and liabilities is insufficient, stockholders who received funds from our trust account could be liable for claims made by creditors. In the event that our offering expenses exceed our estimate
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Under the DGCL, stockholders may be held liable for claims by third parties against a corporation to the extent of distributions received by them in a dissolution. The pro rata portion of our trust account distributed to our public stockholders upon the redemption of our public shares in the event we do not complete our business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offeringTermination Date may be considered a liquidating distribution under Delaware law. If the corporation complies with certain procedures set forth in Section 280 of the DGCL intended to ensure that it makes reasonable provision for all claims against it, including a 60-day notice period during which any third-party claims can be brought against the corporation, a 90-day period during which the corporation may reject any claims brought, and an additional 150-day waiting period before any liquidating distributions are made to stockholders, any liability of stockholders with respect to a liquidating distribution is limited to the lesser of such stockholder’s pro rata share of the claim or the amount distributed to the stockholder, and any liability of the stockholder would be barred after the third anniversary of the dissolution.
Furthermore, if the pro rata portion of our trust account distributed to our public stockholders upon the redemption of our public shares in the event we do not complete our business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offering,Termination Date, is not considered a liquidating distribution under Delaware law and such redemption distribution is deemed to be unlawful, then pursuant to Section 174 of the DGCL, the statute of limitations for claims of creditors could then be six years after the unlawful redemption distribution, instead of three years, as in the case of a liquidating distribution. If we are unable to complete our business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offering,Termination Date, we will: (i) cease all operations except for the purpose of winding up; (ii) as promptly as reasonably possible but not more than ten business days thereafter, redeem the public shares, at a per-share price, payable in cash, equal to the aggregate amount then on deposit in the trust account including interest earned on the funds held in the trust account and not previously released to us to pay our franchise and income taxes (less up to $100,000 of interest to pay dissolution expenses), divided by the number of then outstanding public shares, which redemption will completely extinguish public stockholders’ rights as stockholders (including the right to receive further liquidating distributions, if any), subject to applicable law; and (iii) as promptly as reasonably possible following such redemption, subject to the approval of our remaining stockholders and our board of directors, dissolve and liquidate, subject in each case to our obligations under Delaware law to provide for claims of creditors and the requirements of other applicable law. Accordingly, it is our intention to redeem our public shares as soon as reasonably possible following our 24th monththe Termination Date and, therefore, we do not intend to comply with those procedures. As such, our stockholders could potentially be liable for any claims to the extent of distributions received by them (but no more) and any liability of our stockholders may extend well beyond the third anniversary of such date.
Because we will not be complying with Section 280, Section 281(b) of the DGCL requires us to adopt a plan, based on facts known to us at such time that will provide for our payment of all existing and pending claims or claims that may be potentially brought against us within the subsequent 10 years. However, because we are a blank check company, rather than an operating company, and our operations will be limited to searching for prospective target businesses to acquire, the only likely claims to arise would be from our vendors (such as lawyers, investment bankers, etc.) or prospective target businesses. As described above, pursuant to the obligation contained in our underwriting agreement, we will seek to have all vendors, service providers (other than our independent registered public accounting firm), prospective target businesses or other entities with which we do business execute agreements with us waiving any right, title, interest or claim of any kind in or to any monies held in the trust account. As a result of this obligation, the claims that could be made against us are significantly limited and the likelihood that any claim that would result in any liability extending to the trust account is remote. Further, our sponsor may be liable only to the extent necessary to ensure that the amounts in the trust account are not reduced below (i) $10.20 per public share or (ii) such lesser amount per public share held in the trust account as of the date of the liquidation of the trust account, due to reductions in value of the trust assets, in each case net of the amount of interest withdrawn to pay our franchise and income taxes and will not be liable as to any claims under our indemnity of the underwriters of our initial public offering against certain liabilities, including liabilities under the Securities Act. In the event that an executed waiver is deemed to be unenforceable against a third party, our sponsor will not be responsible to the extent of any liability for such third-party claims.
If we file a bankruptcy petition or an involuntary bankruptcy petition is filed against us that is not dismissed, the proceeds held in the trust account could be subject to applicable bankruptcy law, and may be included in our bankruptcy estate and subject to the claims of third parties with priority over the claims of our stockholders. To the extent any bankruptcy claims deplete the trust account, we cannot assure you we will be able to return $10.20 per share to our public stockholders. Additionally, if we file a bankruptcy petition or an involuntary bankruptcy petition is filed against us that is not dismissed, any distributions received by stockholders could be viewed under applicable debtor/creditor and/or bankruptcy laws as either a “preferential transfer” or a “fraudulent conveyance.” As a result, a bankruptcy court could seek to recover all amounts received by our stockholders. Furthermore, our board may be viewed as having breached its fiduciary duty to our creditors and/or may have acted in bad faith, and thereby exposing itself and our company to claims of punitive damages, by paying public stockholders from the trust account prior to addressing the claims of creditors. We cannot assure you that claims will not be brought against us for these reasons.
Our public stockholders will be entitled receive funds from the trust account only upon the earliest to occur of: (a) the completion of our initial business combination, (b) the redemption of any public shares properly tendered in connection with a stockholder vote to amend our amended and restated certificate of incorporation (i) to modify the substance or timing of our obligation to provide holders of our Class A common stock the right to have their shares redeemed in connection with our initial business combination or to redeem 100% of our public shares if we do not complete our initial business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offeringTermination Date or (ii) with respect to any other provisions relating to the rights of holders of our Class A common stock, and (c) the redemption of our public shares if we have not consummated our business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offering,Termination Date, subject to applicable law. These provisions of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, like all provisions of our amended and restated certificate of incorporation, may be amended with a stockholder vote.
Competition
In identifying, evaluating and selecting a target business for our business combination, we may encounter intense competition from other entities having a business objective similar to ours, including other blank check companies, private equity groups and leveraged buyout funds, and operating businesses seeking strategic acquisitions. Many of these entities are well established and have extensive experience identifying and effecting business combinations directly or through affiliates. Moreover, many of these competitors possess greater financial, technical, human and other resources than we do. Our ability to acquire larger target businesses will be limited by our available financial resources. This inherent limitation gives others an advantage in pursuing the acquisition of a target business.
Furthermore, our obligation to pay cash in connection with our public stockholders who exercise their redemption rights may reduce the resources available to us for our initial business combination and our outstanding warrants, and the future dilution they potentially represent, may not be viewed favorably by certain target businesses. Either of these factors may place us at a competitive disadvantage in successfully negotiating an initial business combination.
Facilities
Our executive offices are located at 250 Park1350 Avenue Ste 911,of the Americas, 33rd Floor, New York, NY, 10177,10105, and our telephone number is (212) 213-0243. Our corporate website address is https://focus-impact.com/spac. Our executive offices are provided to us by an affiliate of our sponsor. Commencing on the date that the Company’s securities were first listed on Nasdaq through the earlier of the consummation of the initial business combination and the Company’s liquidation, the Company began to reimburse an affiliate of the sponsor for office space, administrative and support services provided to the Company in the amount of $10,000 per month. We consider our current office space adequate for our current operations.
Employees
We currently have twothree officers. Members of our management team are not obligated to devote any specific number of hours to our matters but they intend to devote as much of their time as they deem necessary to our affairs until we have completed our initial business combination. The amount of time that any such person will devote in any time period will vary based on whether a target business has been selected for our initial business combination and the current stage of the business combination process.
Periodic Reporting and Financial Information
We have registered our units, Class A common stock and warrants under the Exchange Act and have reporting obligations, including the requirement that we file annual, quarterly and current reports with the SEC. The SEC maintains an internet site at http://www.sec.gov that contains such reports, proxy and information statements and other information regarding issuers that file electronically with the SEC. In accordance with the requirements of the Exchange Act, our annual reports will contain financial statements audited and reported on by our independent registered public accounting firm.
We will provide stockholders with audited financial statements of the prospective target business as part of the tender offer materials or proxy solicitation materials sent to stockholders to assist them in assessing the target business. In all likelihood, these financial statements will need to be prepared in accordance with GAAP or IFRS, depending on the circumstances and the historical financial statements may be required to be audited in accordance with the standards of the PCAOB. These financial statement requirements may limit the pool of potential target businesses we may conduct an initial business combination with because some targets may be unable to provide such financial statements in time for us to disclose such financial statements in accordance with federal proxy rules and complete our initial business combination within the prescribed time frame. We cannot assure you that any particular target business identified by us as a potential acquisition candidate will have financial statements prepared in accordance with such requirements or that the potential target business will be able to prepare its financial statements in accordance with such requirements. To the extent that this requirement cannot be met, we may not be able to acquire the proposed target business. While this may limit the pool of potential acquisition candidates, we do not believe that this limitation will be material.
We will beare required to evaluate our internal controls over financial reporting procedures for the fiscal year ending December 31, 20212023 as required by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Only in the event we are deemed to be a large accelerated filer or an accelerated filer, and no longer qualify as an emerging growth company, will we be required to have our internal control over financial reporting procedures audited. A target company may not be in compliance with the provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act regarding adequacy of their internal controls over financial reporting. The development of the internal controls of any such entity to achieve compliance with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act may increase the time and costs necessary to complete any such acquisition.
You should consider carefully all of the risks described below, together with the other information contained in this Report, including the financial statements. If any of the following risks occur, our business, financial condition and operating results may be materially adversely affected. The risk factors described below are not necessarily exhaustive and you are encouraged to perform your own investigation with respect to us and our business.
Risks Relating to the Company and our Management Team
Potential conflicts of interest with other businesses of Auldbrass Partners or other businesses with which our officers or directors may have fiduciary or contractual obligations could negatively impact the performance of an investment in us.
There are potential conflicts of interest that could impact our company and our search for, and pursuit of, potential business combination opportunities, including potential conflicts associated with the interests and activities of Auldbrass Partners. These potential conflicts are discussed in more detail elsewhere in this Report and are not, and are not intended to be, a complete enumeration or explanation of all of the potential conflicts of interest that may arise.
Auldbrass Partners is an indirect investor in our sponsor. In addition, Howard Sanders, one of our directors,lead director, is currently affiliated with Auldbrass Partners as a Founding Partner and a Managing Director in its advisory business.
Auldbrass Partners manages or advises (and intends to manage and advise in the future) several investment programs. Funds managed by Auldbrass Partners may compete with us for acquisition opportunities. If these funds decide to pursue any such opportunity, we may be precluded from procuring such opportunities. In addition, investment ideas generated within Auldbrass Partners may be suitable for both us and for a current or future Auldbrass Partners fund or investee company and may be directed to such entity rather than to us. Auldbrass Partners, our management team and members of our advisory board do not have any obligation to present us with any opportunity for a potential business combination of which they become aware. See Item 1A. “Risk Factors”, including Item 1A. “Risk Factors—Potential conflicts of interest with other businesses of Auldbrass Partners or other businesses with which our officers, directors or members of the advisory board may have fiduciary or contractual obligations could negatively impact the performance of an investment in us.”
Our sponsor, investors in our sponsor, our directors and officers and members of our advisory board are, or may in the future become, affiliated with entities that are engaged in a similar business. Our sponsor, investors in our sponsor, our directors and officers and members of our advisory board are also not prohibited from sponsoring, or otherwise becoming involved with, any other blank check companies prior to us completing our initial business combination. In particular, Mr. Moore is a memberMessrs. Stanton, Lyles, Thorn and Carter and Ms. Simms are officers and/or members of the board of directors of LongviewFocus Impact BH3 Acquisition Corp. II,Company, a special purpose acquisition company that completed its initial public offering in MarchOctober 2021, which may pursue initial business combination targets in a range of businesses or industries similar to ours. Any such special purpose acquisition companies, including LongviewFocus Impact BH3 Acquisition Corp. II,Company, may present additional conflicts of interest in pursuing an acquisition target. In addition, our officers and directors (including our advisory board members), in their other endeavors (including any affiliation or relationship they may have with Auldbrass Partners), may choose or be required to present potential business combinations to Auldbrass Partners or to third parties, before they present such opportunities to us. As a result, if any of our officers, directors or members of our advisory board becomes aware of a business combination opportunity which is suitable for an entity to which he or she has then-current fiduciary or contractual obligations, he or she will need to honor such fiduciary or contractual obligations to present such business combination opportunity to such entity, before we can pursue such opportunity. If these other entities decide to pursue any such opportunity, we may be precluded from pursuing the same. However, we do not expect these duties to materially affect our ability to complete our initial business combination. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that we renounce our interest in any business combination opportunity offered to any director or officer unless such opportunity is expressly offered to such person solely in his or her capacity as a director or officer of our company and it is an opportunity that we are able to complete on a reasonable basis. Our directors and officers are not required to commit any specified amount of time to our affairs, and, accordingly, will have conflicts of interest in allocating management time among various business activities, including identifying potential business combinations and monitoring the related due diligence.
Similarly, if Auldbrass Partners becomes aware of a potential business combination opportunity that could be an attractive opportunity for our company, Auldbrass Partners is not under any obligation to source any potential opportunities for our initial business combination or refer any such opportunities to our company or provide any other services to our company, other than certain advisory and administrative services. Auldbrass Partners may have fiduciary and/or contractual duties to other entities and, as a result, may have a duty to offer business combination opportunities to those entities before other parties, including our company. Additionally, certain companies with which Auldbrass Partners has a relationship may enter into transactions with, provide goods or services to, or receive goods or services from an entity with which we seek to complete our initial business combination. Transactions of these types may present a conflict of interest if Auldbrass Partners may directly or indirectly receive a financial benefit as a result of such transaction. We believe that any such potential conflicts of interest of Auldbrass Partners and any of our officers or directors that are affiliated with Auldbrass Partners will be naturally mitigated by the differing nature of services that Auldbrass Partners typically provides to its clients, as compared to our activities related to pursuing an initial business combination.
In addition, each of our sponsor, directors and officers does, directly or indirectly, own, founder shares and/or private placement warrants following our initial public offering and, accordingly, may have a conflict of interest in determining whether a particular target business is an appropriate business with which to effectuate our initial business combination. Further, such directors and officers may have a conflict of interest with respect to evaluating a particular business combination if the retention or resignation of any such officers and directors was included by a target business as a condition to any agreement with respect to our initial business combination. Our sponsor may offer incentives, including an indirect interest in our sponsor to Auldbrass Partners employees or others who materially contribute to the identification or execution of our initial business combination.
Our officers and directors will allocate their time to other businesses thereby causing conflicts of interest in their determination as to how much time to devote to our affairs. This conflict of interest could have a negative impact on our ability to complete our initial business combination.
Our officers and directors are not required to, and will not, commit their full time to our affairs, which may result in a conflict of interest in allocating their time between our operations and our search for a business combination and their other businesses. We do not intend to have any full-time employees prior to the completion of our initial business combination. Each of our officers is engaged in other business endeavors for which he may be entitled to substantial compensation and our officers are not obligated to contribute any specific number of hours per week to our affairs. Our directors also serve as officers or board members for other entities. If our officers’ or directors’ other business affairs require them to devote substantial amounts of time to such affairs in excess of their current commitment levels, it could limit their ability to devote time to our affairs which may have a negative impact on our ability to complete our initial business combination. For a complete discussion of our officers’ and directors’ other business affairs, please see Item 10. “Directors, Executive Officers and Corporate Governance” and Item 13. “Certain Relationships and Related Transactions, and Director Independence.”
Certain of our officers and directors are now, and all of them may in the future become, affiliated with entities engaged in business activities similar to those intended to be conducted by us and, accordingly, may have conflicts of interest in allocating their time and determining to which entity a particular business opportunity should be presented.
Until we consummate our initial business combination, we will continue to engage in the business of identifying and combining with one or more businesses. Our sponsor and officers and directors are, and may in the future become, affiliated with entities that are engaged in a similar business.
Our officers and directors also may become aware of business opportunities which may be appropriate for presentation to us and the other entities to which they owe certain fiduciary or contractual duties. Accordingly, they may have conflicts of interest in determining to which entity a particular business opportunity should be presented. These conflicts may not be resolved in our favor and a potential target business may be presented to another entity prior to its presentation to us. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that we renounce our interest in any corporate opportunity offered to any director or officer unless such opportunity is expressly offered to such person solely in his or her capacity as a director or officer of our company and such opportunity is one we are legally and contractually permitted to undertake and would otherwise be reasonable for us to pursue.
For a complete discussion of our officers’ and directors’ business affiliations and the potential conflicts of interest that you should be aware of, please see Item 13. “Certain Relationships and Related Transactions, and Director Independence.”
Our officers, directors, security holders and their respective affiliates may have competitive pecuniary interests that conflict with our interests.
We have not adopted a policy that expressly prohibits our directors, officers, security holders or affiliates from having a direct or indirect pecuniary or financial interest in any investment to be acquired or disposed of by us or in any transaction to which we are a party or have an interest. In fact, we may enter into a business combination with a target business that is affiliated with our sponsor, our directors or officers, although we do not intend to do so. We do not have a policy that expressly prohibits any such persons from engaging for their own account in business activities of the types conducted by us. Accordingly, such persons or entities may have a conflict between their interests and ours.
We may engage in a business combination with one or more target businesses that have relationships with entities that may be affiliated with our sponsor, officers, directors or existing holders which may raise potential conflicts of interest.
In light of the involvement of our sponsor, officers and directors with other entities, we may decide to acquire one or more businesses affiliated with our sponsor, officers or directors. Our directors also serve as officers and board members for other entities, including, without limitation, those described under Item 13. “Certain Relationships and Related Transactions, and Director Independence.” Such entities may compete with us for business combination opportunities. Our sponsor, officers and directors are not currently aware of any specific opportunities for us to complete our business combination with any entities with which they are affiliated, and there have been no preliminary discussions concerning a business combination with any such entity or entities. Although we are not specifically focusing on, or targeting, any transaction with any affiliated entities, we would pursue such a transaction if we determined that such affiliated entity met our criteria for a business combination as set forth in Item 1. “Business — “Business—Selection of a Target Business and Structuring of Our Initial Business Combination” and such transaction was approved by a majority of our disinterested directors.
Despite our agreement to obtain an opinion from an independent investment banking firm or from an independent accounting firm, regarding the fairness to our company from a financial point of view of a business combination with one or more domestic or international businesses affiliated with our officers, directors or existing holders, potential conflicts of interest still may exist and, as a result, the terms of the business combination may not be as advantageous to our public stockholders as they would be absent any conflicts of interest.
We are dependent upon our officers and directors and their departure could adversely affect our ability to operate.
Our operations are dependent upon a relatively small group of individuals. We believe that our success depends on the continued service of our officers and directors, at least until we have completed our initial business combination. We do not have an employment agreement with, or key-man insurance on the life of any of our other directors or officers. The unexpected loss of the services of one or more of our directors or officers could have a detrimental effect on us.
In June 2021, Wes Moore, the chairman of our board of directors, announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination to run for governor of the State of Maryland. If Mr. Moore were to win the general election in November 2022, he would be required to resign from his position as chairman and leave our board of directors. If this were to occur, whether prior to or following our initial business combination, we expect that our board of directors would promptly appoint a new chairman, but we cannot assure you that Mr. Moore’s resignation would not have material adverse effect on our business, investments and results of operations.
Our ability to successfully effect our initial business combination and to be successful thereafter will be totally dependent upon the efforts of our key personnel, some of whom may join us following our initial business combination. The loss of key personnel could negatively impact the operations and profitability of our post-combination business.
Our ability to successfully effect our business combination is dependent upon the efforts of our key personnel. The role of our key personnel in the target business, however, cannot presently be ascertained. Although some of our key personnel may remain with the target business in senior management or advisory positions following our business combination, it is likely that some or all of the management of the target business will remain in place. While we intend to closely scrutinize any individuals we engage after our initial business combination, we cannot assure you that our assessment of these individuals will prove to be correct. These individuals may be unfamiliar with the requirements of operating a company regulated by the SEC, which could cause us to have to expend time and resources helping them become familiar with such requirements.
In addition, the officers and directors of an acquisition candidate may resign upon completion of our initial business combination. The departure of a business combination target’s key personnel could negatively impact the operations and profitability of our post-combination business. The role of an acquisition candidate’s key personnel upon the completion of our initial business combination cannot be ascertained at this time. Although we contemplate that certain members of an acquisition candidate’s management team will remain associated with the acquisition candidate following our initial business combination, it is possible that members of the management of an acquisition candidate will not wish to remain in place. The loss of key personnel could negatively impact the operations and profitability of our post-combination business.
Our key personnel may negotiate employment or consulting agreements with a target business in connection with a particular business combination. These agreements may provide for them to receive compensation following our business combination and as a result, may cause them to have conflicts of interest in determining whether a particular business combination is the most advantageous.
Our key personnel may be able to remain with the company after the completion of our business combination only if they are able to negotiate employment or consulting agreements in connection with the business combination. Such negotiations would take place simultaneously with the negotiation of the business combination and could provide for such individuals to receive compensation in the form of cash payments and/or our securities for services they would render to us after the completion of the business combination. The personal and financial interests of such individuals may influence their motivation in identifying and selecting a target business. However, we believe the ability of such individuals to remain with us after the completion of our business combination will not be the determining factor in our decision as to whether or not we will proceed with any potential business combination. There is no certainty, however, that any of our key personnel will remain with us after the completion of our business combination. We cannot assure you that any of our key personnel will remain in senior management or advisory positions with us. The determination as to whether any of our key personnel will remain with us will be made at the time of our initial business combination. In addition, pursuant to an agreement entered into concurrently with the issuance and sale of the securities in our initial public offering, our sponsor, upon consummation of an initial business combination, will be entitled to nominate three individuals for election to our board of directors.
Past performance by our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board and their respective affiliates may not be indicative of future performance of an investment in us.
Information regarding performance by, or business associated with, our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board and their respective affiliates is presented for informational purposes only. Past experience or performance of our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board or their respective affiliates or related entities is not a guarantee of either (1) our ability to successfully identify and execute a transaction or (2) success with respect to any business combination that we may consummate. You should not rely on the historical record of our management team, Auldbrass Partners, members of our advisory board or their respective affiliates or related entities or any investment’s performance as indicative of the future performance of any investment in us or the returns we will, or are likely to, generate going forward. An investment in us is not an investment in Auldbrass Partners.
Members of our management team and board of directors have significant experience as founders, board members, officers or executives of other companies. As a result, certain of those persons have been, may be, or may become, involved in proceedings, investigations and litigation relating to the business affairs of the companies with which they were, are, or may in the future be, affiliated. This may have an adverse effect on us, which may impede our ability to consummate an initial business combination.
During the course of their careers, members of our management team and board of directors have had significant experience as founders, board members, officers or executives of other companies. As a result of their involvement and positions in these companies, certain persons were, are now, or may in the future become, involved in litigation, investigations or other proceedings relating to the business affairs of such companies or transactions entered into by such companies. Any such litigation, investigations or other proceedings may divert our management team’s and board’s attention and resources away from identifying and selecting a target business or businesses for our initial business combination and may negatively affect our reputation, which may impede our ability to complete an initial business combination.
There is substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a “going concern.”
As of December 31, 2023, we had $224,394 in cash held outside of the trust account. Further, we have incurred and expect to continue to incur significant costs in pursuit of our business combination plans. If we are unable to raise sufficient capital when needed, our business, financial condition and results of operations will be materially and adversely affected, and we will need to significantly modify our operational plans to continue as a going concern. These factors, among others, raise substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern. The financial statements contained elsewhere in this prospectus do not include any adjustments that might result from our inability to continue as a going concern.
Risks Relating to Our Search for, and Consummation of or Inability to Consummate, a Business Combination
Our public stockholders may not be afforded an opportunity to vote on our proposed business combination, which means we may complete our initial business combination even if a majority of our public stockholders do not support such a combination.
We may not hold a stockholder vote to approve our initial business combination unless the business combination would require stockholder approval under applicable law or stock exchange listing requirements or if we decide to hold a stockholder vote for business or other legal reasons. Except as required by law, the decision as to whether we will seek stockholder approval of a proposed business combination or will allow stockholders to sell their shares to us in a tender offer will be made by us, solely in our discretion, and will be based on a variety of factors, such as the timing of the transaction and whether the terms of the transaction would otherwise require us to seek stockholder approval. Accordingly, we may complete our initial business combination even if holders of a majority of our public shares do not approve of the business combination we complete.
If we seek stockholder approval of our initial business combination, after approval of our board, our initial stockholders have agreed to vote in favor of such initial business combination, regardless of how our public stockholders vote.
Our initial stockholders have agreed to vote their founder shares, as well as any public shares purchased during or after our initial public offering, in favor of our initial business combination. Following redemptions in connection with the Second Extension Meeting, the sponsor holds approximately 77% of the outstanding shares of the company. As a result, in addition to our initial stockholders’ founder shares, weno additional public shares would need 8,625,001, or 37.5%, of the 23,000,000 public shares outstanding to be voted in favor of a transaction (assuming all outstanding shares are voted) in order to have our initial business combination approved. Our initial stockholders will own shares representing 20% of our outstanding shares of common stock. Accordingly, if we seek stockholder approval of our initial business combination, after approval of our board, it is more likely that the necessary stockholder approval will be received than would be the case if our initial stockholders agreed to vote their founder shares in accordance with the majority of the votes cast by our public stockholders.
Your only opportunity to affect the investment decision regarding a potential business combination will be limited to the exercise of your right to redeem your shares from us for cash, unless we seek stockholder approval of the business combination.
At the time of your investment in us, you werewill not be provided with an opportunity to evaluate the specific merits or risks of one or more target businesses. Since our board of directors may complete a business combination without seeking stockholder approval, public stockholders may not have the right or opportunity to vote on the business combination, unless we seek such stockholder vote. Accordingly, if we do not seek stockholder approval, your only opportunity to affect the investment decision regarding a potential business combination may be limited to exercising your redemption rights within the period of time (which will be at least 20 business days) set forth in our tender offer documents mailed to our public stockholders in which we describe our initial business combination.
The ability of our public stockholders to redeem their shares for cash may make our financial condition unattractive to potential business combination targets, which may make it difficult for us to enter into a business combination with a target.
We may seek to enter into a business combination transaction agreement with a prospective target that requires as a closing condition that we have a minimum net worth or a certain amount of cash. If too many public stockholders exercise their redemption rights, we would not be able to meet such closing condition and, as a result, would not be able to proceed with the business combination. Furthermore, in no event will we redeem our public shares in an amount that would cause our net tangible assets to be less than $5,000,001. Consequently, if accepting all properly submitted redemption requests would cause our net tangible assets to be less than $5,000,001 upon consummation of our initial business combination or such greaterany amount necessary to satisfy a closing condition as described above, we would not proceed with such redemption and the related business combination and may instead search for an alternate business combination. Prospective targets will be aware of these risks and, thus, may be reluctant to enter into a business combination transaction with us.
The ability of our public stockholders to exercise redemption rights with respect to a large number of our shares may not allow us to complete the most desirable business combination or optimize our capital structure.
At the time we enter into an agreement for our initial business combination, we will not know how many stockholders may exercise their redemption rights, and therefore will need to structure the transaction based on our expectations as to the number of shares that will be submitted for redemption. If our business combination agreement requires us to use a portion of the cash in the trust account to pay the purchase price, or requires us to have a minimum amount of cash at closing, we will need to reserve a portion of the cash in the trust account to meet such requirements, or arrange for third party financing. In addition, if a larger number of shares are submitted for redemption than we initially expected, we may need to restructure the transaction to reserve a greater portion of the cash in the trust account or arrange for third party financing. Raising additional third party financing may involve dilutive equity issuances or the incurrence of indebtedness at higher than desirable levels. The above considerations may limit our ability to complete the most desirable business combination available to us or optimize our capital structure. The amount of the deferred underwriting commissions payable to the underwriters will not be adjusted for any shares that are redeemed in connection with a business combination. The per-share amount we will distribute to stockholders who properly exercise their redemption rights will not be reduced by the deferred underwriting commission and after such redemptions, the per-share value of shares held by non-redeeming stockholders will reflect our obligation to pay the deferred underwriting commissions.
The ability of our public stockholders to exercise redemption rights with respect to a large number of our shares could increase the probability that our initial business combination would not be consummated and that you would have to wait for liquidation in order to redeem your stock.
If our business combination agreement requires us to use a portion of the cash in the trust account to pay the purchase price, or requires us to have a minimum amount of cash at closing, the probability that our initial business combination would not be consummated is increased. If our initial business combination is unsuccessful, you would not receive your pro rata portion of the trust account until we liquidate the trust account. If you are in need of immediate liquidity, you could attempt to sell your stock in the open market; however, at such time our stock may trade at a discount to the pro rata amount per share in the trust account. In either situation, you may suffer a material loss on your investment or lose the benefit of funds expected in connection with our redemption until we liquidate or you are able to sell your stock in the open market.
The requirement that we complete our initial business combination within the prescribed time frame may give potential target businesses leverage over us in negotiating a business combination and may decrease our ability to conduct due diligence on potential business combination targets as we approach our dissolution deadline, which could undermine our ability to complete our business combination on terms that would produce value for our stockholders.
Any potential target business with which we enter into negotiations concerning a business combination will be aware that we must complete our initial business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offering.Termination Date.
Consequently, such target business may obtain leverage over us in negotiating a business combination, knowing that if we do not complete our initial business combination with that particular target business, we may be unable to complete our initial business combination with any target business. This risk will increase as we get closer to the timeframe described above. In addition, we may have limited time to conduct due diligence and may enter into our initial business combination on terms that we would have rejected upon a more comprehensive investigation.
Our search for a business combination, and any target business with which we ultimately consummate a business combination, may be materially adversely affected by major public health crises like the recent coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreakCOVID-19 pandemic and the status of U.S. and global economy, including the debt and equity markets.
On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization characterized the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak as a “pandemic.” The COVID-19 outbreak has resulted in, and a significant outbreak of other infectious diseases could result in, a widespreadA major public health crisis could impact the U.S. and global economy. Disruptions to commercial activity (such as the imposition of quarantines or travel restrictions) or, more generally, a failure to contain or effectively manage a public health crisis may adversely affecting the economiesimpact our search for a business combination and financial markets worldwide, potentially including the business of any potential target business with which we intend to consummate a business combination. Furthermore, we may be unable to complete a business combination at all if concerns relating to COVID-19 continue to restrict travel, limit the ability to have meetings with potential investors or make it impossible or impractical to negotiate and consummate a transaction with the target company’s personnel, vendors and service providers in a timely manner, if at all. The extent to which COVID-19 impacts our search for a business combination will depend on future developments, which are highly uncertain and cannot be predicted, including the actions to contain COVID-19 or its impact, among others. While vaccines for COVID-19 are being, and have been developed, there is no guarantee that any such vaccine will be durable and effective consistent with current expectations and we expect it will take significant time before the vaccines are available and accepted on a significant scale The disruptions posed by COVID-19 or other public health emergencies, diseases or matters of global concern could materially adversely affect our ability to consummate a business combination, or the operations of a target business with which we ultimately consummate a business combination.
In addition,Additionally, while restrictions have generally been lifted globally, and the World Health Organization has declared the end of the COVID-19 global health emergency, the COVID-19 pandemic contributed, and any future public health crisis could contribute, to adverse impacts on global commercial activity and supply chain operations and significant volatility in the equity and debt markets. Such volatility could impact our ability to consummate a transaction that may be dependent on the ability to raise equity and debt financing which may be impacted by COVID-19 and other events, including as a resultfinancing.
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We may not be able to complete our initial business combination within the prescribed time frame, in which case we would cease all operations except for the purpose of winding up and we would redeem our public shares and liquidate, in which case our public stockholders may only receive $10.20 per share, or less than such amount in certain circumstances, and our warrants will expire worthless.
Our sponsor, officers and directors have agreed that we must complete our initial business combination within 18 months fromby the closing of our initial public offering.Termination Date. We may not be able to find a suitable target business and complete our initial business combination within such time period. If we have not completed our initial business combination within such time period, we will: (i) cease all operations except for the purpose of winding up; (ii) as promptly as reasonably possible but not more than ten business days thereafter, redeem the public shares, at a per-share price, payable in cash, equal to the aggregate amount then on deposit in the trust account including interest earned on the funds held in the trust account and not previously released to us to pay our franchise and income taxes (less up to $100,000 of interest to pay dissolution expenses), divided by the number of then outstanding public shares, which redemption will completely extinguish public stockholders’ rights as stockholders (including the right to receive further liquidating distributions, if any), subject to applicable law; and (iii) as promptly as reasonably possible following such redemption, subject to the approval of our remaining stockholders and our board of directors, dissolve and liquidate, subject in each case to our obligations under Delaware law to provide for claims of creditors and the requirements of other applicable law. In such case, our public stockholders may only receive $10.20 per share, and our warrants will expire worthless. In certain circumstances, our public stockholders may receive less than $10.20 per share on the redemption of their shares. See “—If third parties bring claims against us, the proceeds held in the trust account could be reduced and the per-share redemption amount received by stockholders may be less than $10.20 per share” and other risk factors below.
If we are unable to complete an initial business combination withinby the 18-month period,Termination Date, we may seek an amendment to our amended and restated certificate of incorporation to extend the period of time we have to complete an initial business combination beyond 18 months.the Termination Date. Our amended and restated certificate of incorporation requires that such an amendment be approved by holders of 65% of our outstanding common stock.
Because of our limited resources and the significant competition for business combination opportunities, it may be more difficult for us to complete our initial business combination. If we are unable to complete our initial business combination, our public stockholders may receive only approximately $10.20 per share on our redemption of our public shares, or less than such amount in certain circumstances, and our warrants will expire worthless.
We have encountered and expect to encounter intense competition from other entities having a business objective similar to ours, including private investors (which may be individuals or investment partnerships), other blank check companies and other entities, domestic and international, competing for the types of businesses we intend to acquire. Many of these individuals and entities are well-established and have extensive experience in identifying and effecting, directly or indirectly, acquisitions of companies operating in or providing services to various industries. Many of these competitors possess greater technical, human and other resources or more local industry knowledge than we do and our financial resources are relatively limited when contrasted with those of many of these competitors. While we believe there are numerous target businesses we could potentially acquire with the net proceeds of our initial public offering and the sale of the private placement warrants, our ability to compete with respect to the acquisition of certain target businesses that are sizable is limited by our available financial resources. This inherent competitive limitation gives others an advantage in pursuing the acquisition of certain target businesses. Furthermore, because we are obligated to pay cash for the shares of Class A common stock which our public stockholders redeem in connection with our initial business combination, target companies will be aware that this may reduce the resources available to us for our initial business combination.
This may place us at a competitive disadvantage in successfully negotiating a business combination. If we are unable to complete our initial business combination, our public stockholders may receive only approximately $10.20 per share on the liquidation of our trust account and our warrants will expire worthless. In certain circumstances, our public stockholders may receive less than $10.20 per share upon our liquidation. See “—If third parties bring claims against us, the proceeds held in the trust account could be reduced and the per-share redemption amount received by stockholders may be less than $10.20 per share” and other risk factors below.
If we seek stockholder approval of our initial business combination, our sponsor, directors, officers, advisors and their affiliates may elect to purchase shares from public stockholders, which may influence a vote on a proposed business combination and reduce the public “float” of our Class A common stock.
If we seek stockholder approval of our initial business combination and we do not conduct redemptions in connection with our business combination pursuant to the tender offer rules, our sponsor, directors, officers, advisors or their affiliates may purchase shares in privately negotiated transactions or in the open market either prior to or following the completion of our initial business combination, although they are under no obligation to do so. Such a purchase may include a contractual acknowledgement that such stockholder, although still the record holder of our shares is no longer the beneficial owner thereof and therefore agrees not to exercise its redemption rights. In the event that our sponsor, directors, officers, advisors or their affiliates purchase shares in privately negotiated transactions from public stockholders who have already elected to exercise their redemption rights, such selling stockholders would be required to revoke their prior elections to redeem their shares. The purpose of such purchases could be to vote such shares in favor of the business combination and thereby increase the likelihood of obtaining stockholder approval of the business combination, or to satisfy a closing condition in an agreement with a target that requires us to have a minimum net worth or a certain amount of cash at the closing of our business combination, where it appears that such requirement would otherwise not be met. This may result in the completion of our business combination that may not otherwise have been possible.
In addition, if such purchases are made, the public “float” of our Class A common stock and the number of beneficial holders of our securities may be reduced, possibly making it difficult to maintain the quotation, listing or trading of our securities on a national securities exchange.
If a stockholder fails to receive notice of our offer to redeem our public shares in connection with our business combination, or fails to comply with the procedures for tendering its shares, such shares may not be redeemed.
We will comply with the tender offer rules or proxy rules, as applicable, when conducting redemptions in connection with our business combination. Despite our compliance with these rules, if a stockholder fails to receive our tender offer or proxy materials, as applicable, such stockholder may not become aware of the opportunity to redeem its shares. In addition, the proxy solicitation or tender offer materials, as applicable, that we will furnish to holders of our public shares in connection with our initial business combination will describe the various procedures that must be complied with in order to validly tender or redeem public shares. For example, we may require our public stockholders seeking to exercise their redemption rights, whether they are record holders or hold their shares in “street name,” to either tender their certificates to our transfer agent prior to the date set forth in the tender offer documents or proxy materials mailed to such holders, or up to two business days prior to the vote on the proposal to approve the business combination in the event we distribute proxy materials, or to deliver their shares to the transfer agent electronically. In the event that a stockholder fails to comply with these or any other procedures, its shares may not be redeemed.
You will not be entitled to protections normally afforded to investors of many other blank check companies.
Since the net proceeds of our initial public offering and the sale of the private placement warrants are intended to be used to complete an initial business combination with a target business, we may be deemed to be a “blank check” company under the United States securities laws. However, because we will have net tangible assets in excess of $5,000,000, we are exempt from rules promulgated by the SEC to protect investors in blank check companies, such as Rule 419. Accordingly, investors will not be afforded the benefits or protections of those rules. Among other things, this means that we will have a longer period of time to complete our business combination than do companies subject to Rule 419. Moreover, if our initial public offering were subject to Rule 419, that rule would prohibit the release of any interest earned on funds held in the trust account to us unless and until the funds in the trust account were released to us in connection with our completion of an initial business combination.
If we seek stockholder approval of our initial business combination and we do not conduct redemptions pursuant to the tender offer rules, and if you or a “group” of stockholders are deemed to hold in excess of 15% of our Class A common stock, you will lose the ability to redeem all such shares in excess of 15% of our Class A common stock.
If we seek stockholder approval of our initial business combination and we do not conduct redemptions in connection with our initial business combination pursuant to the tender offer rules, our amended and restated certificate of incorporation provides that a public stockholder, together with any affiliate of such stockholder or any other person with whom such stockholder is acting in concert or as a “group” (as defined under Section 13 of the Exchange Act), will be restricted from seeking redemption rights with respect to more than an aggregate of 15% of the shares sold in our initial public offering, which we refer to as the “Excess“Excess Shares,” without our prior consent. However, we would not be restricting our stockholders’ ability to vote all of their shares (including Excess Shares) for or against our business combination. Your inability to redeem the Excess Shares will reduce your influence over our ability to complete our business combination and you could suffer a material loss on your investment in us if you sell Excess Shares in open market transactions.
Additionally, you will not receive redemption distributions with respect to the Excess Shares if we complete our business combination. And as a result, you will continue to hold that number of shares exceeding 15% and, in order to dispose of such shares, would be required to sell your stock in open market transactions, potentially at a loss.
If the net proceeds of our initial public offering and the sale of the private placement warrants not being held in the trust account are insufficient to allow us to operate until MayNovember 1, 2023,2024 (if extended), we may be unable to complete our initial business combination, in which case our public stockholders may only receive $10.20 per share, or less than such amount in certain circumstances, and our warrants will expire worthless.
The funds available to us outside of the trust account may not be sufficient to allow us to operate until MayNovember 1, 2023,2024 (if extended), assuming that our initial business combination is not completed during that time. We believe that the funds available to us outside of the trust account are sufficient to allow us to operate until MayNovember 1, 2023;2024; however, we cannot assure you that our estimate is accurate. Of the funds available to us, we could use a portion of the funds available to us to pay fees to consultants to assist us with our search for a target business. We could also use a portion of the funds as a down payment or to fund a “no-shop” provision (a provision in letters of intent designed to keep target businesses from “shopping” around for transactions with other companies on terms more favorable to such target businesses) with respect to a particular proposed business combination, although we do not have any current intention to do so. If we entered into a letter of intent where we paid for the right to receive exclusivity from a target business and were subsequently required to forfeit such funds (whether as a result of our breach or otherwise), we might not have sufficient funds to continue searching for, or conduct due diligence with respect to, a target business. If we are unable to complete our initial business combination, our public stockholders may receive only approximately $10.20 per share on the liquidation of our trust account and our warrants will expire worthless. In certain circumstances, our public stockholders may receive less than $10.20 per share upon our liquidation. See “—If third parties bring claims against us, the proceeds held in the trust account could be reduced and the per-share redemption amount received by stockholders may be less than $10.20 per share” and other risk factors below.
If the net proceeds of our initial public offering and the sale of the private placement warrants not being held in the trust account are insufficient, it could limit the amount available to fund our search for a target business or businesses and complete our initial business combination and we will depend on loans from our sponsor or management team to fund our search for a business combination, to pay our franchise and income taxes and to complete our initial business combination. If we are unable to obtain these loans, we may be unable to complete our initial business combination.
Of the net proceeds of our initial public offering, and the sale of the private placement warrants and borrowings from related parties, only approximately $1,900,000$224,394 (as of December 31, 2021) will be2023) are available to us outside the trust account to fund our working capital requirements. If we are required to seek additional capital, we would need to borrow funds from our sponsor, management team or other third parties to operate or may be forced to liquidate. Neither our sponsor, members of our management team nor any of their affiliates is under any obligation to advance funds to us in such circumstances. Any such advances would be repaid only from funds held outside the trust account or from funds released to us upon completion of our initial business combination. We do not expect to seek loans from parties other than our sponsor or an affiliate of our sponsor as we do not believe third parties will be willing to loan such funds and provide a waiver against any and all rights to seek access to funds in our trust account. If we are unable to obtain these loans, we may be unable to complete our initial business combination. If we are unable to complete our initial business combination because we do not have sufficient funds available to us, we will be forced to cease operations and liquidate the trust account. Consequently, our public stockholders may only receive approximately $10.20 per share on our redemption of our public shares, and our warrants will expire worthless. In certain circumstances, our public stockholders may receive less than $10.20 per share on the redemption of their shares. See “—If third parties bring claims against us, the proceeds held in the trust account could be reduced and the per-share redemption amount received by stockholders may be less than $10.20 per share” and other risk factors below.
If third parties bring claims against us, the proceeds held in the trust account could be reduced and the per-share redemption amount received by stockholders may be less than $10.20 per share.
Our placing of funds in the trust account may not protect those funds from third-party claims against us. Although we will seek to have all vendors, service providers (other than our independent registered public accounting firm), prospective target businesses or other entities with which we do business execute agreements with us waiving any right, title, interest or claim of any kind in or to any monies held in the trust account for the benefit of our public stockholders, such parties may not execute such agreements, or even if they execute such agreements they may not be prevented from bringing claims against the trust account, including, but not limited to, fraudulent inducement, breach of fiduciary responsibility or other similar claims, as well as claims challenging the enforceability of the waiver, in each case in order to gain advantage with respect to a claim against our assets, including the funds held in the trust account. If any third party refuses to execute an agreement waiving such claims to the monies held in the trust account, our management will perform an analysis of the alternatives available to it and will only enter into an agreement with a third party that has not executed a waiver if management believes that such third party’s engagement would be significantly more beneficial to us than any alternative. The underwriters of our initial public offering will not execute an agreement with us waiving such claims to the monies in the trust account.
Examples of possible instances where we may engage a third party that refuses to execute a waiver include the engagement of a third party consultant whose particular expertise or skills are believed by management to be significantly superior to those of other consultants that would agree to execute a waiver or in cases where management is unable to find a service provider willing to execute a waiver. In addition, there is no guarantee that such entities will agree to waive any claims they may have in the future as a result of, or arising out of, any negotiations, contracts or agreements with us and will not seek recourse against the trust account for any reason. Upon redemption of our public shares, if we are unable to complete our business combination within the prescribed timeframe, or upon the exercise of a redemption right in connection with our business combination, we will be required to provide for payment of claims of creditors that were not waived that may be brought against us within the 10 years following redemption. Accordingly, the per-share redemption amount received by public stockholders could be less than the $10.20 per share initially held in the trust account, due to claims of such creditors. Our sponsor has agreed that it will be liable to us if and to the extent any claims by a vendor for services rendered or products sold to us, or a prospective target business with which we have discussed entering into a transaction agreement, reduce the amount of funds in the trust account to below (i) $10.20 per public share or (ii) such lesser amount per public share held in the trust account as of the date of the liquidation of the trust account due to reductions in the value of the trust assets, in each case net of the interest that may be withdrawn to pay our franchise and income taxes. This liability will not apply with respect to any claims by a third party who executed a waiver of any and all rights to seek access to the trust account and except as to any claims under our indemnity of the underwriters of our initial public offering against certain liabilities, including liabilities under the Securities Act. Moreover, in the event that an executed waiver is deemed to be unenforceable against a third party, then our sponsor will not be responsible to the extent of any liability for such third party claims. We have not independently verified whether our sponsor has sufficient funds to satisfy its indemnity obligations and believe that our sponsor’s only assets are securities of our company. We have not asked our sponsor to reserve for such indemnification obligations. Therefore, our sponsor may not be able to satisfy those obligations. As a result, if any such claims were successfully made against the trust account, the funds available for our initial business combination and redemptions could be reduced to less than $10.20 per public share. In such event, we may not be able to complete our initial business combination, and you would receive such lesser amount per share in connection with any redemption of your public shares. None of our officers will indemnify us for claims by third parties including, without limitation, claims by vendors and prospective target businesses.
We may not have sufficient funds to satisfy indemnification claims of our directors and officers, and our obligation to indemnify our directors and officers may have certain adverse consequences.
We have agreed to indemnify our officers and directors to the fullest extent permitted by law. However, our officers and directors have agreed to waive (and any other persons who may become an officer or director prior to the initial business combination will also be required to waive) any right, title, interest or claim of any kind in or to any monies in the trust account and not to seek recourse against the trust account for any reason whatsoever (except to the extent they are entitled to funds from the trust account due to their ownership of public shares). Accordingly, any indemnification provided will be able to be satisfied by us only if (i) we have sufficient funds outside of the trust account or (ii) we consummate an initial business combination and the post-combination business has sufficient funds to provide such indemnification. Our obligation to indemnify our officers and directors may discourage stockholders from bringing a lawsuit against our officers or directors for breach of their fiduciary duty. These provisions also may have the effect of reducing the likelihood of derivative litigation against our officers and directors, even though such an action, if successful, might otherwise benefit us and our stockholders. Furthermore, a stockholder’s investment may be adversely affected to the extent we pay the costs of settlement and damage awards against our officers and directors pursuant to these indemnification provisions.
Our directors may decide not to enforce the indemnification obligations of our sponsor, resulting in a reduction in the amount of funds in the trust account available for distribution to our public stockholders.
In the event that the proceeds in the trust account are reduced below the lesser of (i) $10.20 per public share or (ii) such lesser amount per share held in the trust account as of the date of the liquidation of the trust account due to reductions in the value of the trust assets, in each case net of the interest which may be withdrawn to pay our franchise and income taxes, and our sponsor asserts that it is unable to satisfy its obligations or that it has no indemnification obligations related to a particular claim, our independent directors would determine whether to take legal action against our sponsor to enforce its indemnification obligations.
While we currently expect that our independent directors would take legal action on our behalf against our sponsor to enforce its indemnification obligations to us, it is possible that our independent directors in exercising their business judgment may choose not to do so if, for example, the cost of such legal action is deemed by the independent directors to be too high relative to the amount recoverable or if the independent directors determine that a favorable outcome is not likely. If our independent directors choose not to enforce these indemnification obligations, the amount of funds in the trust account available for distribution to our public stockholders may be reduced below $10.20 per share.
The securities in which we invest the proceeds held in the trust account could bear a negative rate of interest, which could reduce the interest income available for payment of taxes or reduce the value of the assets held in trust such that the per share redemption amount received by stockholders may be less than $10.20 per share.
The net proceeds of our initial public offering and certain proceeds from the sale of the private placement warrants, in the amount of $234,600,000, may only be invested in direct U.S. Treasury obligations having a maturity of 185 days or less, or in certain money market funds which invest only in direct U.S. Treasury obligations. While short-term U.S. Treasury obligations currently yield a positive rate of interest, they have briefly yielded negative interest rates in recent years. Central banks in Europe and Japan pursued interest rates below zero in recent years, and the Open Market Committee of the Federal Reserve has not ruled out the possibility that it may in the future adopt similar policies in the United States. In the event of very low or negative yields, the amount of interest income (which we may withdraw to pay income taxes, if any) would be reduced. In the event that we are unable to complete our initial business combination, our public stockholders are entitled to receive their pro-rata share of the proceeds held in the trust account, plus any interest income. If the balance of the trust account is reduced below $204,000,000 as a result of negative interest rates, the amount of funds in the trust account available for distribution to our public stockholders may be reduced below $10.20 per share.
If, after we distribute the proceeds in the trust account to our public stockholders, we file a bankruptcy petition or an involuntary bankruptcy petition is filed against us that is not dismissed, a bankruptcy court may seek to recover such proceeds, and we and our board may be exposed to claims of punitive damages.
If, after we distribute the proceeds in the trust account to our public stockholders, we file a bankruptcy petition or an involuntary bankruptcy petition is filed against us that is not dismissed, any distributions received by stockholders could be viewed under applicable debtor/creditor and/or bankruptcy laws as either a “preferential transfer” or a “fraudulent conveyance.” As a result, a bankruptcy court could seek to recover all amounts received by our stockholders. In addition, our board of directors may be viewed as having breached its fiduciary duty to our creditors and/or having acted in bad faith, thereby exposing itself and us to claims of punitive damages, by paying public stockholders from the trust account prior to addressing the claims of creditors.
If, before distributing the proceeds in the trust account to our public stockholders, we file a bankruptcy petition or an involuntary bankruptcy petition is filed against us that is not dismissed, the claims of creditors in such proceeding may have priority over the claims of our stockholders and the per-share amount that would otherwise be received by our stockholders in connection with our liquidation may be reduced.
If, before distributing the proceeds in the trust account to our public stockholders, we file a bankruptcy petition or an involuntary bankruptcy petition is filed against us that is not dismissed, the proceeds held in the trust account could be subject to applicable bankruptcy law, and may be included in our bankruptcy estate and subject to the claims of third parties with priority over the claims of our stockholders. To the extent any bankruptcy claims deplete the trust account, the per-share amount that would otherwise be received by our stockholders in connection with our liquidation may be reduced.
If we are deemed to be an investment company under the Investment Company Act, we may be required to institute burdensome compliance requirements and our activities may be restricted, which may make it difficult for us to complete our business combination.
If we are deemed to be an investment company under the Investment Company Act, our activities may be restricted, including:
restrictions on the nature of our investments; and
restrictions on the issuance of securities, each of which may make it difficult for us to complete our business combination.