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This thesis explores and evaluates the drivers and performance factors of merger and acquisition (M&A) activity at Deutsche Post DHL (DPDHL). Furthermore, the “success paradox” related to M&A found in theory is addressed by analyzing how well it rhymes with the activity and performance of M&As at DPDHL. The methodology used to reach the aim can be characterized as an explorative and qualitative case study with an inductive approach. We review literature and interview stakeholders both within and outside the DPDHL group to present an in-depth view of the drivers causing M&As and factors affecting the performance of the transactions at DPDHL. Consequently, it has been possible to reach reality driven conclusions and recommendations tailored for DPDHL. We found that the success rate of M&A transactions at DPDHL is high and primarily triggered by strategic motives, such as achieving market power, acquiring capabilities, accessing new markets and to follow customers. In addition, we found that overall, DPDHL has systems and procedures that are consistent with theory findings and views of practitioners. However, we found two improvement areas for the overall success rate of transactions at DPDHL. Firstly, the biggest change for DPDHL going forward will lie within post-merger integration and management. There is a need to develop an independent, non-political, and transparent setup for M&A teams to better integrate and track performance after each transaction. The aim should be to create local ownership at all levels to better reap synergy effects. Secondly, there is a potential benefit to streamline the strategic models used to retain key people after the M&As. Moreover, relating the findings of the study to the “success paradox”, we argue that success ought to be measured on multiple motives instead of by only measuring financial outcome of deals as done historically. In our view, the inadequate measurement of M&A performance is a reason for the seemingly high failure rates found in empirical studies. It would only be logic to measure the success of something by assessing whether or not the motives were achieved, be that strategic or financial.

Main interest of this diploma thesis is a transaction known as leveraged acquisition. The goal is to provide detailed overview of these transactions starting from history and development of leveraged acquisitions, key market participants, acquisition financing, leveraged acquisition market and its current trends and analysis of a fictional transaction using advanced financial model. Due to the limited extent of the thesis not all aspects of debt financing and modeling could have been covered in the text.

This dissertation describes issues related with management of merger & acquisition projects. There are several publications and articles related to mergers and acquisitions in the Czech Republic but they focus on subareas (accounting, tax or legal implications). Intention of the author of the dissertation is to present comprehensive view at mergers and acquisitions and compose recommendations for managers who will be responsible for future merger and acquisition projects. The dissertation contain analysis of experiences from past acquisition projects and analysis of elements which influence merger and acquisition projects. Another part focuses on merger and acquisition structuring and description of important parts of any acquisition project. Author sent questionnaire to Crowe Horwath International firms and executed assessment of responses related to questions from mergers and acquisitions. Outcome of the dissertation contain model of five stages recommended to merger and acquisition projects, resources for creating value during mergers and acquisitions, limitation of mergers and acquisitions and reasons for merger and acquisition decisions. For better explanation are numerous examples, case studies and charts used in particular sections.

Studien undersöker hur fyra stora, skandinaviska, serieförvärvande företag som är verksamma på den svenska marknaden ser på förvärvsuppföljning, hur förvärvsuppföljning ter sig samt vad företagen gör med information som utvinns genom uppföljning. En kvalitativ metod användes och studien baseras på intervjuer med de undersökta företagen. Studiens slutsats är att, även om företagen anser att förvärvsuppföljning är viktig, så genomförs inte uppföljning av förvärvsprojekt i samtliga företag på så vis som tidigare forskning föreslår. I de studerade företagen följs de finansiella målen oftast upp, medan uppföljning av icke-finansiella mått sker genom en mer löpande och ad hoc avstämning. Vidare finner studien indikationer på att erfarenhet spelar roll vid förvärvsprocessen och att integration är av betydelse gällande förvärvsuppföljning.

Today, mergers and acquisitions often grab headlines due to the large sums of money involved, and the number of stakeholders affected by it. Still, the increase in merger and acquisition activities, the capital involved, and the pervasiveness of these activities stand in sharp contrast to their high rates of failures. Scholars have attributed the failure of mergers and acquisitions to management failure when it comes to dealing with human aspects during the integration phase. The purpose of this paper was to examine how individual’s identities change overtime in a merger. More specifically, it examines the process of post-merger organizational identification in merger contexts through the lens of social identity theory. From this purpose, we formulated the following research question and two sub-questions: • How can post-merger identification be managed and integrated in an organization? o How can organizational identities transit from a pre-merger state to a post-merger state successfully? o What is the outcome of the post-merger identification process? The method used in this study was qualitative with an interpretive approach, which allowed us to gain a deeper understanding regarding the purpose and to answer our research question. Primary data came from purposive sampling, where 14 semi-structured interviews with individuals with various managerial positions in post-merger integrations were conducted to gain an understanding of how they tackled the integration process. The secondary data used resulted from previous research, literature, articles and other internet sources. The interviews were qualitatively analyzed through a thematic coding procedure. The backbone of our theory consists of perspectives on mergers and acquisitions from the lens of social identity theory. Particularly, it was used to understand the post-merger organizational identification process. The theoretical components were used to understand group formations and intra- and intergroup relationships, the effects mergers have on individuals, and what the effects of the outcomes of post-merger identification have on group and organizational identity. Our findings disclose that organizational identities are exclusive by nature and that they remain in this state unless managerial actions are taken which triggers commitment from groups to change. These actions must combine communication efforts with managerial interventions which promote intergroup cooperation, prototypical norms and values. Depending on the actions and the goal of the merger, the nature of the post-merger identity is a combination of two identities which forms an overarching one, or an assimilation of one identity into another. The contributions from this study come in two forms: theoretical and managerial. The theoretical contributions come through our findings showing how organizational identity emerge, change and how they are formed. The managerial contributions provide recommendations on how practitioners should facilitate the process, the vital role the manager has in the process and approaches they could take based on our findings.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine how the outcome of mergers and acquisitions are perceived from different managerial positions in the acquiring firm and how managerial expectations can affect the perception of the outcome. Empirical data were gathered through an explorative multiple case study of five acquisitions at three companies by interviewing eight managers at different positions as well as reviewing secondary data. The data was analyzed and cross-case compared in order to detect possible differences between managers at different positions. The findings shows that financial and non-financial aspects are deemed important for how the outcome is perceived by different managers. The findings further indicate that financial aspects are more prominent for managers occupying a position with financial responsibility. The non-financial aspects are on the other hand perceived as important regardless of managerial position. Lastly, the empirical findings indicate that expectations held by individual managers are more dependent on the organizational motive of the acquisition rather than the position held by the manager and that not all expectations have to be fulfilled in order for the acquisition to be perceived as successful.

In the last decade, the number of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activities by emerging market firms has rapidly increased to exploit growing markets at home and abroad. In order to be successful in their M&A goals, these firms need to develop a specific M&A capability and manage post-M&A processes effectively. Drawing on the dynamic capabilities view, I develop a theoretical framework for emerging market acquirers that outlines the development of the acquisition capability mechanisms. I first examine the influence of prior acquisition experience on acquisition performance. I then go on to study the integration capability of emerging market firms and examine the effect of post-M&A integration strategies on the performance of acquisitions by emerging market firms. The overall results indicate that a firm‘s focal acquisition performance positively relates to prior acquisition experience that is similar to the focal acquisition. Moreover, post-M&A integration strategies vary depending on the geographical similarity of the focal acquisition. Replacing the target‘s top manager is a particularly important determinant of acquisition performance in domestic M&A. Finally, in this research, I also extend the organisational learning view and develop a multi-level analysis that examines the role of business groups alongside firm-level learning from acquisitions. The usual focus in emerging market studies is on the big emerging economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC). I focus instead on the country case of Turkey, one of the second tier of ―biggish‖ growing economies of ―MIST‖ (Mexico, Indonesia, South Korea and Turkey). The empirical results are based on a unique hand-collected dataset of acquisitions in Turkey culled from publicly available data. The final dataset consists of 279 acquisitions between 1998 and 2011.

Cross-border M & A had became a very important method of foreign direct investment for global multinational companies, and it is playing an increasingly important role to the growth of international production. Not only in developed countries but also in developing countries.For most of Chinese large-scale companies, Cross-border M&A had became a very attractive way to expend their business. Thus, Chinese cross-border M&A has developed rapidly. However, Different with the trend of global M&A market, the Chinese cross-border M&A prefer cash payment. Well then, How many payment forms are widely used in Chinese cross-border M&A? What are the determine factors of cash-payment preference in Chinese cross-border M&A? Does cash payment have the best operational performance in Chinese cross-border M&A? I will search answers for these three questions in this paper.In order to answer these three questions, first, I drew on the results of previous studies to classify the different available payment forms in Chinese cross-border M&A and detailed expound the characteristics and operate approaches of them. Then, Combined with my understanding of Chinese cross-border M&A, I summarized some possible factors which determined the preference in cash-payment for Chinese cross-border M&AAfter all of these done, I chose some important financial indexes as data in my empirical study to analyze the performance of different payment forms in applied of Chinese cross-border M&A. And tested if cash payment have the best operational performance in Chinese cross-border M&A.

This thesis investigates three topics in empirical corporate finance. In the first essay, the focus is on the role of financial constraints in the market for corporate control. In the second and third essays, we explore the effect of personal connections at board and executive levels on corporate credit rating and initial public offering (IPO) underpricing respectively. In the first essay, using a large sample of US acquisitions made between 1985 and 2013, we study the effect of financial constraints on acquisition gains and acquisition likelihood. Our findings show that financial constraints of target companies significantly increase acquisition premiums and abnormal returns for both parties. Our results further show that the presence of financial constraints in the target is one of the most important determinants of a takeover bid. This supports the idea that acquisitions may improve the ability of financially constrained companies to access capital through a better reallocation of resources within segments of the same company (e.g., internal capital market) or through better access to external markets. This would eventually benefit bidders too, as new capital would be invested in valuable growth opportunities that otherwise would expire unexercised. In the second essay, using a large sample of US public debt issues we show that personal connections between directors of issuing companies and rating agencies result in higher credit ratings. We estimate the average effect to be about one notch. The results are robust to several alternative tests including additional controls for managerial traits, placebo tests and propensity score matching. Moreover, our tests on default rates and bond yields do not appear to reflect a favourable treatment by the rating agency. Rather, they suggest that personal connections act as a mechanism to reduce asymmetric information between the rating agency and the issuer. In the final essay, using a large sample of IPOs in the U.S. we show that interpersonal connections between directors and top executives in issuers and underwriting banks result in significantly lower levels of IPO underpricing. We also examine the issuers' long-term stock returns following their IPOs. Our results indicate that the connected companies' long-term returns are not significantly different from the non-connected companies. This suggests that underwriters set lower levels of underpricing for the connected companies not to treat them favourably, but due to better flow of and stronger reliance on soft information and lower risk exposure.