Mergers and acquisitions : The road to success

Abstract: Background: The most common reason to mergers and acquisitions is to generate synergies. Synergies emerge when two collaborating companies show a better result together than they would have done separately. Even though mergers and acquisitions have taken place since the beginning of the 17th century many of them still fail to succeed. There are many reasons why. Despite the fact that the reasons of failure have been known for a long time, new waves of mergers and acquisitions still appear. Purpose: The purpose of the thesis is to contribute with knowledge about what should be given priority, in the merger and acquisition process, to generate synergies and thereby create shareholder value. This is achieved by investigating mergers and acquisitions in Sweden during the period 1996-2001. Method: The thesis includes both quantitative and qualitative research. The quantitative research is calculations made to decide each company’s performances compared to index and the qualitative research is interviews made with representatives from the companies. Result: There are no superior methods that can guarantee success, however there are certain aspects that always should be given priority. According our research those are among others: thorough due diligence, creating a committee of integration in order to keep focus on core business.