Corporate governance has changed dramatically since passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 and the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010. The level of shareholder engagement and institutional investor expectations regarding governance practices have also changed significantly. The passage of the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act in April 2012, which helped spur the initial public offering market, raised concerns among certain groups that new initial public offering (“IPO”) candidates would view certain of the accommodations available under the Act as a rationale to relax their governance practices and to rely on phase-in periods. However, emerging growth companies, or EGCs, availing themselves of the JOBS Act’s Title I “IPO on-ramp” provisions generally have adopted rigorous governance policies and procedures.

In this review, we assess the corporate governance practices adopted by EGCs. We examined the filings of (i) the approximately 580 EGCs (on an aggregated basis) that completed their IPOs in the period from January 1, 2013 through December 31, 2015 and (ii) the 157 EGCs (on a standalone basis) that completed their IPOs during the year ended December 31, 2015. Our objective is to provide data that will be useful to you in assessing whether your company’s current or proposed corporate governance practices are consistent with EGC market practice.