Workflow — HSR Filing Prep

HSR filings drafted in days, not weeks.

Threshold analysis, item-by-item HSR form prep, and 4(c)/4(d) document collection — drafted, indexed, and ready for antitrust counsel review. Filing package and risk memo into iManage, NetDocuments, or your matter system. Replaces antitrust paralegals at a fraction of the per-filing cost.

Take the AI Assessment Get a Per-Filing ROI Model

$25K–$150K

Per filing all-in at antitrust paralegals

2–4 weeks

Typical filing prep cycle from agreement signing

60–85%

Volume off the paralegal line after AI cutover

What This Replaces

The Antitrust Paralegal Stack on Every HSR-Reportable Deal

The work the antitrust paralegal does on every HSR filing — and the cost of leaving it there.

The labor

HSR and antitrust filing prep today moves through antitrust paralegals at deal counsel firms (Wachtell, Skadden, Sullivan & Cromwell, and the rest of the M&A bar) and ALSPs at UnitedLex, Axiom, Elevate, Integreon, and Big Four NewLaw arms. Per-filing all-in cost runs $25K–$150K at the paralegal stack, with 4(c)/4(d) document collection and review absorbing the bulk of the labor. A complex multi-jurisdiction filing (HSR + EU + UK + China + Brazil) can run into seven figures.

The cycle time

Standard HSR filing prep takes 2–4 weeks from agreement signing to filing-ready package, with longer cycles when the 4(c)/4(d) document collection is genuinely contested or when the deal involves multi-jurisdiction parallel filings. Every week the filing isn't out the door is a week the 30-day waiting period hasn't started, the deal team is stuck on the antitrust gate, and a competitor or regulator can reposition before the deal closes.

The Workflow

Input · Analysis · Output

What goes into HSR filing prep, what we do to it, and what shows up on antitrust counsel's desk.

Input

Deal documents and party data

Definitive agreement and ancillary deal documents
Acquiring person and acquired person financials
Voting securities, asset, and corporate-structure data
Industry market data and competitive overlap analysis
Internal deal documents (Item 4(c) and 4(d) candidates)
Prior HSR filings and clearance history
Multi-jurisdiction filing requirements (EU, UK, China, etc.)

Analysis

Threshold, form, document

Size-of-transaction and size-of-person threshold analysis
Exemption analysis (40 CFR Part 802)
Item-by-item HSR form completion
4(c)/4(d) document collection from custodian sources
Privileged-document exclusion and document logging
Affiliate and minority-investment analysis
Confidence score per finding; exceptions to antitrust counsel queue

Output

Filing package + risk memo

Item-by-item HSR form draft
4(c)/4(d) document index with privilege log
Threshold and exemption analysis memo
Antitrust risk memo for the deal team
Multi-jurisdiction filing checklist
iManage Work / NetDocuments matter filing
Filing-event audit trail

Side by Side

HSR Filing Prep Today vs. With Last Rev

The numbers that matter: cycle time, per-filing cost, accuracy, and audit posture.

Dimension	Antitrust Paralegal Stack	Last Rev HSR Filing Prep
Cycle time, signing to filing-ready package	2–4 weeks (longer with multi-jurisdiction)	2–6 days
Per-filing unit cost	$25K–$150K per filing all-in	Per-filing, benchmarked at 25–45% of paralegal-stack unit cost
4(c)/4(d) document collection scope	Manual custodian interviews, narrow scope, often re-done	Systematic collection from custodian sources with completeness audit
Audit log per finding	Paralegal notes, no item-level lineage	Source data + threshold rule + model version + confidence per finding
Multi-jurisdiction parallel filing handling	Sequential, jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction prep	Parallel filing checklist with per-jurisdiction differential analysis
Privilege-aware document logging	Manual privilege screen during 4(c)/4(d) collection	Privilege-aware first-pass with attorney exception queue
Renegotiation leverage at next paralegal-stack renewal	None — you're locked in	60–85% of routine filing prep volume off the contract

How It Works

From Deal Signing to Filing-Ready Package

Five steps. Every one logged. Every one reversible if your confidence threshold isn't met.

Submission Lands

Definitive agreement, party financials, corporate-structure data, and industry market data from deal counsel. 4(c)/4(d) custodian list and document-source inventory built during week 0.

Extraction & Classification

Size-of-transaction and size-of-person threshold analysis. Exemption analysis (40 CFR Part 802). Item-by-item HSR form drafting. 4(c)/4(d) document collection from custodian sources with privilege-aware first-pass screening.

Validation Against Antitrust Bar

Findings validated against current HSR thresholds, FTC/DOJ guidance, and your firm's antitrust playbook. Anything below your confidence threshold per finding is routed to a human exception queue — your call which queue, ours or yours.

Push to Matter System

Item-by-item HSR form draft, 4(c)/4(d) document index with privilege log, threshold analysis memo, and antitrust risk memo delivered into iManage Work, NetDocuments, or your matter system. Multi-jurisdiction filing checklist for parallel filings.

Audit Log Persisted

Every threshold determination, exemption analysis, document-collection event, and privilege call logged with the source data, applicable rule, model version, prompt, and confidence score. Privilege-aware logging — work product stays inside your environment.

Compliance & Defensibility

Built to Meet the Quality Bar Antitrust Counsel Already Runs On

HSR Act and Premerger Notification Rules

Threshold analysis tracks the HSR Act and 40 CFR Part 801–803 premerger notification rules. Annual threshold updates flow into the validation engine on the FTC effective date. Item-by-item HSR form prep follows the most recent FTC form revision.

4(c)/4(d) collection defensibility

4(c)/4(d) document collection traces from the custodian source to the indexed deliverable with completeness coverage tracked. If FTC/DOJ requests a Second Request, the audit trail produces the basis for collection scope and the privilege calls — cleaner than reconstructing from a paralegal's spreadsheet.

Privilege-aware document logging

Privileged documents identified at first-pass and routed to attorney review for the privilege call. The audit log records the basis for any privileged-or-not determination so the firm can defend the privilege log if challenged during a Second Request investigation.

Deal confidentiality & data residency

Pre-signing and pre-filing deal information is highly confidential and material non-public information. Deployable in your VPC or our SOC 2 environment. Encryption in transit and at rest; retention policies tied to your matter and post-closing record-retention rules.

Common Questions

What Deal Counsel Asks About HSR Filing Prep

PNC Premerger Notification Compliance, HSR.com, FormHSR, and similar platforms are HSR-form-prep tools — they handle the form mechanics. The competitor on this page is the antitrust-paralegal labor line on your deal budget — paralegals at the M&A bar (Wachtell, Skadden, Sullivan & Cromwell) and ALSPs at UnitedLex, Axiom, Elevate, Integreon, or Big Four NewLaw arms billed at $25K–$150K per filing. We undercut that labor cost, integrate directly into your matter system, and deliver item-by-item form drafts, 4(c)/4(d) indexes with privilege logs, and antitrust risk memos.

M&A due diligence is the data-room contract review for the deal. Regulatory submission review is the agency-bound filing workflow for FDA, SEC, FINRA, FERC. HSR filing prep is the antitrust-specific workflow for premerger notification — threshold analysis, item-by-item HSR form prep, and 4(c)/4(d) document collection with the antitrust risk memo. Different scopes, different defensibility bar, different agency. We built each as a separate page so the workflow stays specific to what deal counsel buys.

Most deal teams keep the paralegal arrangement in place during pilot and early production — we route exceptions, contested 4(c)/4(d) judgment calls, and any analysis genuinely requiring senior-paralegal expertise to the team you already have. Volume to the paralegal stack drops 60–85% on routine filing prep once cutover completes. You renegotiate at the next renewal from a much better position, or shift the relationship to higher-complexity work like Second Request defense or merger control negotiations.

Our pilot success threshold is threshold-analysis and HSR-form-completion accuracy at parity with or above your incumbent paralegal stack, measured on the same shadow-data sample of historical filings and validated against the antitrust team's calibration set. Anything below your defined confidence threshold per finding is routed to a human exception queue — your call which queue, ours or yours.

4(c)/4(d) document collection runs systematically from the custodian source list with privilege-aware first-pass screening. Privileged-document candidates route to attorney review for the privilege call; the basis is recorded in the privilege log. If FTC/DOJ requests a Second Request, the audit trail produces the basis for collection scope and the privilege calls — cleaner than reconstructing from a paralegal's spreadsheet.

Multi-jurisdiction filings are coordinated through a per-jurisdiction differential analysis that maps the HSR data to each jurisdiction's required form fields and document collection. Filing-deadline staggering, language-localization, and jurisdiction-specific exemption analyses are tracked in the filing checklist. Parallel-filing prep cuts cycle time meaningfully when the deal has 3+ jurisdictions in play.

HSR filing-prep pilots typically run on a single deal — historical filings reviewed during week 1 for calibration, live filing prep on the next eligible deal in weeks 2–4. Production rollout to deal-flow coverage happens after the first pilot meets your accuracy and SLA bar.

We benchmark against your current per-filing all-in cost — typically $25K–$150K at the antitrust-paralegal stack. Our target is 25–45% of that per-filing cost at higher accuracy and faster cycle time. Pricing structures around volume tiers and outcome SLAs, not hourly billable rates.

Two Ways to Start

Take the AI assessment for a structured read on HSR filing-prep feasibility for your practice. Or talk to us if you already know which paralegal line is bleeding the most cost on antitrust filings.

Self-serve · 8 minutes

Take the AI Assessment

A short structured assessment that maps your typical filing volume, your antitrust paralegal arrangement, and your data-room platform to AI feasibility and ROI.

Talk to a specialist

Get a Per-Filing ROI Model

Send us your typical filing volume, your antitrust paralegal arrangement, and your data-room platform. We'll come back with a per-filing unit-cost comparison and a pilot plan in 5 business days.

Other Workflows

More Legal Workflows We Replace

The same approach, applied to the other document-heavy labor lines on your legal-ops or ALSP budget.

M&A Due Diligence Review

Data-room contracts triaged for change-of-control, MAC/MAE, and indemnification — issues list into Intralinks or Datasite in days.

Regulatory Submission

FDA, SEC, FINRA, FERC submissions reviewed for completeness, redaction, and prior-submission consistency before they go out the door.

Covenant Review

Credit agreements abstracted for financial covenants, baskets, EBITDA add-backs, and reporting requirements — into your compliance system.

Contract Review

Third-party paper reviewed against your playbook — clauses extracted, deviations flagged, redlines drafted into iManage or NetDocuments.