Daniela Velando-Otarola

About Daniela Velando-Otarola

I am a Senior Managing Consultant at IBM - Mergers and Acquisitions Strategy and Origination. My team focuses on identifying the strategic priorities for inorganic growth for IBM Consulting and identifying proactively leads for potential acquisitions

Experience

1. m & a Senior Managing Consultant - Consulting Inorganic Strategy

   IBM

   Aug 2023 — Present

   Proactive Origination – Identified and evaluated new target opportunities, redesigning proactive origination workflows and increasing the qualified pipeline by 3X year-over-year. Developed strategic theses to align stakeholders and accelerate go/no-go investment decisions.• Private Equity Ecosystem – Expanded IBM’s global PE network by 25 new firms, strengthening proprietary deal-sourcing channels and improving access to sole-sourced and limited-process transactions.• Inorganic Strategy Setting – Led market and commercial analyses to prioritize inorganic opportunities, conducting TAM analysis, synergy assessment, competitive landscape mapping, and product/technology diligence to shape investment theses and support executive decision-making.• Product Assessment – Designed the framework to assess SaaS product maturity, architecture, scalability, integration readiness, and strategic fit, accelerating pre-diligence timelines and improving the quality of target evaluation.• Deal Execution – Executed M&A processes resulting in the acquisition of three companies across the Americas and the UK (2024–2025), supporting strategic rationale development, business-case creation, and cross-functional alignment to achieve acquisitions

Education

• The George Washington University School of Business

  Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.), International Business

  2014 — 2016

• The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  Bachelor's Degree, International/Global Studies German Minor

  2007 — 2011

Skills

• Event Planning
• Microsoft Office
• Public Speaking
• Spanish
• Problem Solving
• Fundraising
• Policy Analysis
• Strategy
• Powerpoint
• Project Management
• Research
• Teaching
• Training
• Qualitative Research
• Curriculum Design
• Non-Profits
• Microfinance
• Nonprofits
• Editing
• Grant Writing
• Community Outreach