Due diligence
Verify us before you reply.
Every claim on this page links to the primary source. Open each in a new tab. You should not trust any of this until you have checked it yourself.
If anything does not check out, do not reply. See the section at the bottom of this page for what to do instead.
Credentials
What to check and where
Three columns: what you should verify for any M&A outreacher, what ours is, and how to check it independently.
| What to verify | Ours | How to check it |
|---|---|---|
| Named founder | Sadra Khorvash on LinkedIn ↗ | Open the profile. Check the account age, employment history, connections, and recommendations. A profile created last week with no history is a red flag. This one has years of activity. |
| Registered legal entity | Serava.ai, British Columbia, Canada | Contact us to request the registered entity name and registration number — we reply within 24 hours. You can then verify directly at www.bcregistry.gov.bc.ca, which shows registration date, registered address, and current status. |
| Physical address | 1999 Marine Drive, Suite 1004, North Vancouver, BC V7P 3J3, Canada | This is a registered commercial mailing address in North Vancouver, BC — a legitimate CMRA (Commercial Mail Receiving Agency) that satisfies CAN-SPAM and CASL physical-address requirements. Serava is an early-stage remote-first company. Contact us to verify the operating entity details. |
| Email domain | sadra@serava.ai | The email comes from @serava.ai, a domain Serava owns. It is not a Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, or free-provider address. You can verify domain ownership at any WHOIS lookup tool by searching serava.ai. |
| NDA — available before any call | Email sadra@serava.ai — sent immediately, no commitment required | Ask for the NDA before any call. A legitimate firm sends it immediately so you and your attorney can read it before any commitment. If a firm refuses to share their NDA in advance, ask yourself why. |
| Opt-out works | Reply “No Thanks”, or use https://serava.ai/owners/remove | Submit the form at https://serava.ai/owners/remove — it confirms on screen the moment it is recorded, so you are not relying on us to acknowledge anything. Replying "No Thanks" to our email works too; it reaches a person rather than an automated system. Under CAN-SPAM and CASL, opt-out must be honored within 10 business days, and that is the window we hold ourselves to. |
Pattern recognition
Red flags common in M&A outreach
These are the patterns that appear repeatedly in fraudulent or predatory M&A outreach. Read them once. You will recognize them if you see them.
"We have a buyer ready to close right now."
No legitimate buyer will make a real offer without seeing your financials. Anyone who claims otherwise before due diligence has started is either lying or selling you something. A buyer willing to close without financials is a buyer you should not trust.
An upfront fee of any kind.
Research fee, listing fee, marketing retainer, document preparation fee. Any amount. If you pay money before a deal closes, you are dealing with a fraudulent operation. Legitimate M&A platforms either charge the buyer side or take a success fee. Serava charges buyers. You pay nothing.
The buyer's identity is confidential even from you.
You should know who is interested in buying your business before you share anything. A buyer who insists on staying anonymous until you've shared financials is a buyer you cannot vet. Serava does not introduce anonymous buyers.
Pressure to sign or respond quickly.
"This buyer is looking at three other businesses in your area" is a sales tactic. Real acquisition conversations take weeks to months. Artificial urgency is designed to prevent you from doing due diligence. Serava sets no deadlines.
Gmail, Yahoo, or Hotmail sender address.
A legitimate company doing M&A work uses its own domain. Free email addresses have no identity verification, cost nothing, and can be abandoned instantly. If the email came from a free provider, it is not from a professional firm.
Company incorporated offshore with no local address.
Offshore incorporation is not inherently fraudulent, but combined with no local presence and no verifiable address, it is a pattern common in M&A scams. You should be able to find the company in a local registry.
No pricing page or publicly visible fee structure.
If you can't verify how the company makes money, you don't know whose interests they serve. Ask how they earn revenue before sharing anything — a legitimate company answers this question directly.
They won't send you their NDA before the first call.
An NDA is the document that protects you. If a firm refuses to share it in advance, they don't want you reading it carefully. A legitimate firm sends it immediately — before any call, no commitment required.
Cross-check methods
How to verify us without trusting anything on this page
These steps use only external sources. They require nothing from Serava.
Search "Sadra Khorvash" on LinkedIn
You will find the founder profile independently. Compare it to the link above. The profile has history, connections, and employer history.
Verify the registered legal entity
Contact us and ask for the full registered entity name and registration number. We will provide it within 24 hours. You can then verify directly at www.bcregistry.gov.bc.ca. Serava.ai is the operating name; the registered entity behind it is incorporated in British Columbia, Canada.
Do a WHOIS lookup on serava.ai
Search "serava.ai WHOIS" in any search engine and use any WHOIS tool. It will show the domain registration date and registrant information.
Search "Serava.ai" and read third-party mentions
Look for mentions of Serava in industry publications, LinkedIn posts, and forums. You are looking for independent evidence of the company existing before the email you received.
Test the opt-out and see what happens
Reply "No Thanks" to the email you received from us — that's all it takes. A legitimate company will honor opt-out within 10 business days. If you continue to receive emails after that, it is evidence the company does not respect opt-out obligations.
If something does not check out
Do not reply to the email.
If any row in the credential table above fails verification, or if you find something that contradicts what we have published here, do not engage further.
Email sadra@serava.ai with what you found. We would rather you flag an inconsistency than ignore it.
If you have reason to believe you are the target of a phishing attempt using the Serava name, report it to your local consumer protection authority and forward the email to the same address above.