Mergers & Acquisitions in Consultancy Engineering Companies

Abstract: The aim of this case study is to investigate if mergers and acquisition transactions are a value creating activity within engineering consultancy companies before and after the merger and who actually benefits from this activity. The method used for this case study was through qualitative interviews (open-ended & focused interviews), collection of archival records and documents. We began our research by studying different theoretical perspectives presented by numerous researches both historic and present. We searched for different theoretical tools, ways to measure success and failure beyond economic short term profit and also looked into how cultural differences affects the value creation after merging. We looked into hidden motives and what the general opinions are about mergers and acquisitions. Our investigation showed that those who benefited from the merger and acquisition activity were management itself and the shareholders. Those who did not benefit but lost on this activity is the personnel. Our results show that the personnel would have been better off without the acquisition transaction. This explains to some extent the negative and scepticism opinions surrounding this concept.