Transaction Valuations
The McLean Group leverages its combined valuation and M&A expertise to provide niche transaction advisory services. On behalf of buy-side clients, our team performs valuation due diligence to assess the value of acquisition targets and formulate the valuation terms in letters of intent. In addition, we utilize our technical expertise and experience to develop tailored business and forecasting models for our clients.
Team Leaders
Ryan Berry
Ryan Berry is a Managing Director at The McLean Group and heads up the firm’s Valuation Advisory practice. Ryan has over 20 years of financial and accounting experience and has performed and overseen thousands of valuation engagements. During the course of his career, he has advised clients on valuations leading up to their IPO, provided fairness and solvency opinions for M&A transactions and recapitalizations, and worked with clients and their auditors on valuations for financial reporting purposes such as purchase price allocations, impairment testing, and complex security valuations. Ryan has also written and contributed to numerous articles on valuation topics and spoken at various conferences and webinars.
Ryan started his career as a financial analyst at Booz Allen Hamilton. While at Booz, Ryan maintained a TS/SCI clearance and worked in both the DoD and Intelligence Agency divisions where he provided financial and operational support to program managers overseeing several mission critical contracts.
Ryan earned a BA in Economics with a minor in Technology, Management, and Policy from the University of Virginia. He also received an MBA from Johns Hopkins University’s Carey School of Business. He’s a CPA accredited in business valuation through the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.
Professional Credentials
- Certified Public Accountant (Virginia)
- Accredited in Business Valuation (ABV) through the AICPA
Ryan Berry
Managing Director
Valuation Advisory
Scott Sievers
Mr. Sievers is a Managing Director with The McLean Group’s Valuation Services Group. As a Managing Director within the firm’s business valuation practice, he ensures the completion of business valuations for public and private companies for transaction, financial reporting, equity incentive plan, tax, and other purposes.
Since joining the firm, Mr. Sievers has completed over 1000 valuation engagements, which include business valuations, fairness opinions, solvency opinions, portfolio valuations, purchase price allocations, goodwill impairment tests, long-lived intangible asset tests, and equity incentive plan analyses.
Mr. Sievers is one of the leaders of the firm’s ESOP Practice. In addition to attending several ESOP training seminars and conferences, he has completed the full spectrum of ESOP-related valuation engagements ranging from transaction advisory, fairness opinions, feasibility analyses, annual valuations, and solvency opinions. Moreover, Mr. Sievers has the relevant experience dealing with complex ESOP-specific topics, such as transaction structuring, Fair Market Value of debt, repurchase obligations, follow-on transactions, and minority interest discounts.
He is also one of the leaders of the firm’s valuation analytics team, which specializes in valuing complex derivatives typically through applying option-pricing models, binomial lattice models, or Monte Carlo simulations to comply with IRC 409A, ASC 718, ASC 805, and ASC 815 reporting purposes.
Professional Credentials
- CPA (Virginia)
- Accredited in Business Valuation (ABV) through the AICPA
- Certified Valuation Analyst (CVA) through NACVA
Scott Sievers
Managing Director
Valuation Advisory
Representative Engagements
Related News
PCC Elections for Private Company Acquisitions: What PE Sponsors, Portfolio Company CFOs, and Their Advisors Need to Know Before Making the Call
Private Company Council (PCC) accounting elections offer PE-backed companies a meaningful opportunity to reduce the scope and cost of purchase price allocation work, but the decision carries long-term implications that extend well beyond the close. Under ASU 2014-02, private companies may amortize goodwill on a straight-line basis over up to 10 years, eliminating the burden of annual impairment testing. Under ASU 2014-18, customer-related intangibles and noncompetition agreements may be subsumed into goodwill rather than separately recognized and valued. Together, these elections can streamline acquisition accounting and lower ongoing audit and compliance costs, but they also introduce restatement risk if the portfolio company later pursues an IPO or is acquired by a public buyer. For PE sponsors, the decision should be evaluated in the context of the fund’s exit thesis and applied consistently across portfolio companies. […]
Revenue Looks Strong on Paper – But ASC 606 Compliance in Construction Tells a Different Story
Revenue looks strong on paper – but ASC 606 compliance in construction tells a different story. In this case study, The McLean Group’s Financial Consulting and Transaction Due Diligence teams walk through a real construction services engagement where a project-level ASC 606 review surfaced a pattern of revenue recognition issues that materially changed the earnings picture. We examine the KPIs that matter most, including cost-to-complete accuracy, change order approval rates, and over and under billing trends, and explain why ASC 606 compliance deserves the same rigor in diligence as working capital analysis or debt-like items. […]
Purchase Price Allocations Under ASC 805: What Every PE-Backed CFO and Deal Team Needs to Know
A purchase price allocation (PPA) is the first post-close workstream that directly affects reported EBITDA, lender covenant calculations, and eventual exit valuation for PE-backed acquirers. Under ASC 805, every acquisition requires the buyer to allocate the total purchase price to identifiable assets and liabilities at fair value — including intangibles that never appeared on the target’s balance sheet. For middle-market deals, identified intangibles commonly represent 30–60% of total consideration, and each carries its own valuation methodology, useful life assumption, and amortization consequence. The McLean Group’s Valuation Advisory team breaks down what every CFO, controller, and deal team needs to know about getting the allocation right the first time. […]