Mergers and Acquisitions: Reducing M&A risk through improved due diligence

For the past few years, sad stories of gigantic merger failures have been told and retold in the media – for example, the painful sagas of AOL Time Warner, Corus, and Vodafone. M&A veterans trade excruciating war stories among themselves about a multitude of smaller, less notorious disasters. What went wrong with all these deals? In trying to answer that question, analysts have scrutinized and interpreted gigabytes of information. Their conclusions: M&A failure can be attributed to poor synergy, bad timing, incompatible cultures, off-strategy decision-making, hubris, and greed. But one universal lesson has become obvious: making a "deal" work is one of the hardest tasks in business.

This article was published in the journal Strategy & Leadership [volume 32, number 2 2004]. www.emeraldinsight.com/sl.htm.