Mac Mahon Avocats is a Paris business law firm advising software publishers, B2B SaaS companies, marketplaces, fintech and deeptech ventures on prevention, restructuring and French insolvency proceedings.
The value of a technology company rests mainly on intangible assets — source code, intellectual property, recurring customer base, engineering team — which depreciate quickly once distress becomes public. That volatility argues for confidential prevention tools first and, where formal proceedings become unavoidable, for preparing them in advance so as to shorten their duration.
| Procedure | Entry condition | Duration | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ad hoc mandate (mandat ad hoc) | No cessation of payments | Set by the court president, usually 3 months, renewable | Art. L. 611-3 Commercial Code |
| Conciliation | Actual or foreseeable difficulties; cessation of payments for 45 days at most | 4 months + 1 month extension | Art. L. 611-4 to L. 611-16 |
| Safeguard (sauvegarde) | Insurmountable difficulties, no cessation of payments | Observation period 6 months, up to 12 | Art. L. 620-1 et seq. |
| Rehabilitation (redressement judiciaire) | Cessation of payments, recovery possible | Observation period up to 18 months | Art. L. 631-1 et seq. |
| Liquidation | Cessation of payments, recovery manifestly impossible | Variable; business continuation 3 months, renewable | Art. L. 640-1 et seq. |
A declaration of cessation of payments must be filed within 45 days of that state arising, unless a conciliation request is filed within the same period (Art. L. 631-4 of the French Commercial Code).
Not necessarily. Cessation of payments means being unable to meet due and payable liabilities with available assets (Art. L. 631-1 of the Commercial Code). Cash already raised and available is an available asset; an uncalled or conditional investor commitment is not.
Equity instruments are not claims: they are not filed as liabilities and lose their value where the business is sold or liquidated. Liquidation preferences agreed in the shareholders' agreement only bite on liquidation surplus or share sale proceeds, not on the price paid under an asset sale plan.
No. Termination clauses based solely on the opening of insolvency proceedings are deemed unwritten (Art. L. 622-13 of the Commercial Code). The administrator elects whether to continue ongoing contracts, post-petition performance being payable when due.
Source code, trade marks, domain names and licences are intangible assets within the perimeter approved by the court. Transferring personal data requires GDPR compliance: a lawful basis, information of data subjects and an unchanged purpose.
It is, where an agreement has been prepared in conciliation with majority support: it allows the plan to be imposed on dissenting classes of affected parties within a short timeframe (Art. L. 628-1 et seq., classes governed by Art. L. 626-29 et seq.).
Phone: +33 1 45 03 20 20
Email: accueil@macmahon-avocats.fr
Address: 33 avenue Mac-Mahon, 75017 Paris, France