A virtual data room (VDR) is an area that allows multiple parties to access information. They are typically employed in the due diligence process for M&A, fundraising, and corporate restructuring. They provide a safer environment than email and have been proven to improve efficiency by removing the requirement for physical meetings.
The typical vdr service includes features like:
A complete audit trail that tracks who has uploaded and edited, downloaded, or deleted files. This is crucial to demonstrate conformity in the event of a dispute. A good data room should also offer the ability to assign user rights at the document, folder, and individual file levels.
Users can also make notes on documents in the data room. The notes are only seen by the person who created the notes, not by anyone else who is viewing the document. This can be used to speed up the negotiation and review process through the clarification of important documents.
You should also consider an online data room service with features that boost the efficiency of process of negotiating deals, like video calls, integrated chat and Q&A. A good data room provider offers flexible subscription packages which can be modified to meet the needs of a business. A data room should send out automated email notifications to help you keep in mind deadlines, tasks and uploaded documents. For example, IDeals’ iDeals platform gives its customers detailed reports of activities in the virtual data room on a per-page basis, as well as automated email notifications regarding each task. This helps them to keep up with what investors who are interested in, and thus speeds up the closing of the deal.