The deal advisory business LAVA Advisory Partners has declared that it will switch to an employee ownership trust as its ownership structure.

This would be the first boutique M&A advice firm in the UK, according to the company, to switch to such a model.

LAVA Advisory Partners was established in September 2020 with the goal of upending the M&A sector by offering fresh perspectives on both dealmaking and team building. Sector-neutral, the boutique strives to create customized solutions for each client, and as a result, it has established itself as the go-to M&A advisor in the UK for unusual or challenging transactions.

With the help of this strategy, LAVA has been able to increase its workforce in the last year, adding more in-depth technical knowledge and making investments to benefit clients. After experiencing such success, LAVA's founding partners, Simon Woodcock and Hamish Martin, have been thinking back on their original objectives, especially the desire to create a place they actually wanted to work.

The company's leadership has declared that it would switch to an employee ownership trust (EOT) in an effort to maintain that dream. As they have a stake in the company's long-term performance and stand to gain from any future dividends, EOTs provide employees with effective ownership of the business, which may inspire them to spur further growth. In the UK, EOTs are also the type of business ownership that is expanding the fastest. By June 2023, there were 37% more businesses overall that were wholly or partially owned by their employees than there were a year earlier.

LAVA has assisted clients with a number of these transitions in the past. Regarding the relocation, Hamish Martin stated that he thought it would secure the boutique's reputation as an employee-friendly environment and help it reach new heights.