Magister Legum - LLM / This paper focuses on mergers and acquisitions as tools for business growth, how these have come into existence, their strengths, and mainly the reasons for their failure. Taking a closer look on how these have emerged in the United States, United Kingdom and South Africa. Amongst the various ways that companies are able to get business financing, mergers and acquisitions have emerged as one of the most popular strategies for business diversity and growth. Mergers and acquisitions are agreed upon by companies to achieve certain strategic and financial goals. This is usually achieved by the bringing together of two companies with often contrasting corporate personalities, cultures and value systems.¹ The field of mergers and acquisitions has grown greatly over the past half century. At one point, mergers and acquisitions was mainly a US phenomenon but during the 1990‘s their volume in Europe started rivaling that of the USA. By 2000's mergers and acquisitions had become commonly used corporate strategies for companies‘ worldwide.² Even though the number of mergers and acquisition seems to increase and decrease in waves, they have been studied frequently. A study revealed that in 2004 an acquisition was made every 18 minutes all year round. There was normally not a business day that would go by without the news of a merger or an acquisition in the media. The decision to merge, usually taken by the board and shareholders of a company is always preceded by extensive planning and implementation.³ Mergers and acquisitions are part of the continuing process of the growth of companies and as a result of the separation of ownership and management, it is management which will play the dominant part in the initiation of such mergers and acquisition and their motives could be primarily self-interest.⁴ It is expected that merging mostly results in the creation or formation of larger companies or units and if those large companies merge with others, even larger units will result therefrom. The result of that large unit can be a commercial or financial institution which is capable of exerting pressure on a country's economy.⁵ Despite their popularity, most mergers and acquisitions result in financial failures and may produce results that are undesirable for the stakeholders of the company. Some consequences that are usually detrimental to investors are share underperformance, which usually takes place months after the acquisition.⁶ Success of mergers mostly depends on how well the organisations are integrated. This paper will examine mergers and acquisitions in depth, its overview, the motivation of companies to undertake mergers and acquisitions and the reason for its failures. The paper will also examine the regulations and the success of mergers and acquisitions in the United States, United Kingdom and South Africa. Lastly, the last chapter will conclude with a finding of whether mergers and acquisitions can be said to be a strategy for business growth.

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Submitted by BKAB Setor Proc. Técnicos FGV-SP (biblioteca.sp.cat@fgv.br) on 2013-02-26T15:05:37Z No. of bitstreams: 1 1198302156.pdf: 2815905 bytes, checksum: 59d2912f3f181b2f3d4effdbddce1897 (MD5) / A presente monografia tem por objetivo servir de introdução ao estudo sistemático de um tipo de sociedade cada vez mais difundida nacional e internacionalmente: a 'holding'. Assim, ao invés de optarmos por um estudo teórico mais profundo dos aspectos jurídicos do instituto, preferimos uma aproximação mais prática, que permitisse a aplicação dos conceitos expostos na área da administração de empresas. Esta diretriz decorreu naturalmente da área de concentração a que se vincula a monografia, qual seja, Direito Aplicado à Administração.

The objective of this study is to find out whether the leadership theories that are being widely practised by Western countries are being universally accepted in Asian countries, which have different local cultures and values. Both local and multinational companies, situated in Klang Valley, Malaysia, were approached and asked to participate in the quantitative and qualitative surveys. Employers and employees from numerous sectors ranging from banking, plantation, highway and manufacturing sectors participated in this research. Two well established researched sets of developed questionnaires established by renowned management practices, that are the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (Bass and Avolio (1990)) and a slight modification of Leadership Behaviour Questionnaire Form XII (Stodgill, 1963) cited in Cook et. al. (1981) were used as a survey instrument. Descriptive and factor analysis, multiple regression and other statistical analysis were used to make the data more viable to the readers. The study will focus on Malaysia to determine what leadership styles are practised by managers and to determine whether there are any constraints that might hinder the Malaysians from accepting existing leadership theories. The survey will also seek to determine what factors or aspects will motivate both employees and employers to work together effectively to attain a company's vision. It is hoped that the answers derived from the analysis will be of importance to the multinational and local managers enabling them to determine appropriate leadership styles. This could help to boost employees productivity and thus contribute significantly to the overall country productivity, as the international and local companies venture into globalisation and into fragmented local markets.

Trading companies have played and continue to play significant and strategic roles in international trade, supporting the export of manufacturers and the import of purchasing companies. The transaction costs economics, indicated that the role of trading companies is reducing the transaction costs during export. However, the rise of transition economies, such as China, which has become one of the most important players in international trade, leads to two gaps in existing studies. First, the trading companies from these countries and regions have been kept as a “black box”, compared with relative numerous studies on developed countries. Second, the local institutions, which are considered as main determinants on business models in transition economies, are most likely to affect the transaction costs during export, and trading companies’ characteristics and their methods of reducing transaction costs. Therefore, the aims of this study were to explore these institution-related transaction costs in China’s export market, and how Chinese ETCs operate one more efficient indirect export market compared with one direct market between domestic manufacturers and foreign buyers. Correspondingly, the main research questions were: 1) what are the institutions, which generate transaction costs for domestic manufacturers and foreign buyers, in China’s export market? And 2) how do Chinese exporting trading companies respond to such institution-related costs as an intermediary between domestic manufacturers and foreign buyers. A qualitative multiple-case approach was chosen. Six Chinese ETCs were selected, with their export processes as embedded units. The main sources of data included semi-conducted interviews and in-depth field observation. In addition, secondary data, such as newspapers, industrial reports, also contributed to the context of the cases. With one integrative analytical framework, this study identified a couple of institutional constraints in China’s export markets, including the bureaucratic procedures and administrative approvals, inefficient legal system and informal contract obligation, and long-term OEM trading methods. These institutions were involved in the whole procedure of export transaction, from the manufacturing by domestic manufacturers to the purchase by the foreign buyers and generated additional transaction costs in different steps, ranging from search, negotiation, to enforcement. Even though the transaction costs were greatly increased because of the export-related institutional constraints, the findings further reveal that Chinese ETCs can reduce these institution-related transaction costs by a series of effective methods, such as acquirement of knowledge on administrative procedures, collection of information on production, vertical integration, offering supplementary functions for dysfunctional domestic manufacturers and so on. The relevant explanations are twofold. As explained in traditional economic theories, Chinese ETCs’ also relied on economies of scale to reduce institution-related transaction costs. Moreover, Chinese ETCs adopted some approaches affiliated to export-related institutions, such as long-term reselling system and monopoly of export authority in history in China’s export market, and this is the first time that institutional perspective were applied to explain the transaction behaviour of trading companies. To sum up, this study extends our understanding of Chinese export trading companies and export-related institutions in China’s export market, enhances traditional transaction costs analysis on trading companies by adding the perspective from foreign buyers, and integrates institutional perspective into transaction costs analysis to better explain ETCs’ business model in transition economies. Last but not least, the findings in this study are also helpful for practitioners and policy-makers from transition economies in order to improve their export performance and local export-related institutional arrangements.

Business process reengineering (hereafter referred to as BPR) was revolutionary during the early and mid 1990’s. Numerous authors wrote articles and books to appraise the concept and discuss the possible benefits of it. However, the question could be asked whether BPR is still of any relevance in 2001 in South Africa? This question was answered by James Champy in an article published in the Sales & Marketing Management magazine (1998:26) where he stated that: “It has hardly begun. Why? Principally, because we have yet to experience the full effect that the ubiquity of information technology (hereafter referred to as IT) will have on the way we operate. By (that) I mean the omnipresence of highly portable computing and telecommunications devices in the workplace and in the home, combined with the increase in computer literacy and comfort on the part of most adults…and then there is the exploding Internet phenomenon that has provided a platform for universal communications, along with a whole new infrastructure for doing business.” The opportunities for BPR that go hand in hand with the implementation of e-business are numerous and makes BPR as relevant as e-business itself. This is supported by an article in Computerwold published in December 2000: “Today, e-business initiatives have made the need to streamline, integrate and automate processes even more pressing” (Ulrich, 2000) With electronic business still a mere infant in South Africa, and specifically in the short-term insurance industry, its full development can have significant implications on the way businesses operate. A second motivational factor for undertaking this research was personal awareness of the following misconceptions by certain businessmen: - That BPR refers to restructuring, retrenchments and the implementation of IT systems; and - That BPR should be implemented in industries where inventory plays a significant role, e.g. the manufacturing or distribution industries. The following chapters of this dissertation will strive to prove that these are misconceptions and that BPR is based on sound business principles, which include much more than downsizing or the implementation of new IT systems. Very often, a negative connection is drawn with BPR where companies claimed that they have implemented BPR, but in fact, only retrenched staff or implemented new information systems. The dissertation will further strive to prove that the implementation of BPR can also be introduced in industries with no inventory, such as the financial services industry, and with spec ific reference to the short-term insurance industry. / Prof. T.L. Voogt

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The purpose of this study was to investigate the link between environmental reporting and financial reporting by listed South African mining companies in order to determine the degree of integration between these two processes. Many companies disclose environmental information in their financial report (FR) or in a stand-alone environmental (ER) or sustainability report (SR). However, the environmental information contained in these reports does not always satisfy the information needs of shareholders, analysts and investors. In most cases, it appears as if current ERs do not sufficiently reflect the business implications of environmental issues for companies, hence the lack of interest in such reports among investors and analysts. Although many analyses of ERs and FRs have been performed, there is a lack of evidence regarding the relationship between financial reporting and environmental reporting. In an attempt to address this gap in the literature, this study examined the current practice of relating environmental reporting to financial reporting of selected mining companies. The environmental components of sustainability reports (SRs) and the financial reports (FRs) of six of the largest South African mining companies were examined to assess the relationship between environmental and financial reporting. Forty-six environmental disclosure indicators relating to environmental information with business implications were identified from South African legislation, general accounting standards and best practice guidelines. The reports were examined using the indicators as benchmarks. The nature of disclosure for each indicator was recorded for each report. The level of linkage or integration regarding disclosures for the same indicator between the ER and its associated FR was assessed. Integration scores were determined for the main indicator categories, for individual indicators as well as for each company, based on seven potential levels of integration. The study concluded that, generally speaking, the current link between environmental reporting and financial reporting among the sample companies was very limited. The contribution of this study lies in the identification of a wide range of environmental disclosure indicators from a variety of sources, and the application thereof for assessing the relationship between environmental reporting and financial reporting. / Dissertation (MCom)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Accounting / Unrestricted

On June 14th, 1965, Atlantic Acceptance Corporation Limited, a major Canadian finance company failed to meet a $5 million matured short-term secured note and three days later the company was placed in receivership by Montreal Trust Company, the trustee. This thesis represents a study of the growth, development and collapse of Atlantic Acceptance, and the effects of that collapse on the structure of liabilities and the quality of reporting on the activities of finance and consumer loan companies in Canada. From the outset, I would like to bring to the reader's attention the fact that this thesis was completed before the findings of the Ontario Royal Commission on the collapse of Atlantic were made public. The evidence presented to the Commission has been so voluminous and intricate, that after more than two years of study, Mr. Justice Hughes of the Ontario Supreme Court, who served as Chairman of the Ontario Royal Commission on Atlantic, has not yet been able to present his report. It is expected that the above report will be made public later this year (1968). The thesis is divided into three Chapters. Each Chapter is divided into sections which might in themselves have been treated as chapters, except that to do so would have, in my view, broken the continuity of the study. Chapter I serves as an introduction to Atlantic. Here the reader will learn that over the life of the company, especially in the early nineteen-sixties, Atlantic Acceptance Corporation was completely out-performing the Canadian finance industry. In the Appendix to Chapter I, tables are drawn up to trace the growth pattern of Atlantic Acceptance. Chapter I also discusses the general nature of the finance industry, and the methods in which finance companies finance their assets. It concludes by investigating the financing techniques employed by Atlantic Acceptance Corporation. Chapter II is a study of the precipitating factors in the collapse of Atlantic Acceptance. Here, the Haves Lending Model is presented as a normative model for the conduct of the affairs of financial institutions. The rather exhaustive and comprehensive evidence on Atlantic's lending, management and auditing practices presented in this Chapter, indicates that the affairs of Atlantic Acceptance and its subsidiaries were not conducted in accordance with the principles collected and published by Professor Douglas Hayes. In Chapter II it will be learned that Montreal Trust Company, the trustee, brought legal action against the President of Atlantic and members of the accounting firm which audited the subsidiaries, alleging a conspiracy on the part of the defendants and each of them to defraud the plaintiff. In Chapter III the concern is with the effects of the collapse of Atlantic Acceptance on the structure of liabilities and the quality of reporting on the activities of finance and consumer loan companies in Canada. Evidence is presented to show that: (1) as a result of Atlantic's collapse, finance and consumer loan companies in Canada saw a flight of funds out of their short-term paper, and an increase in their use of bank borrowings and advances from parent and associated companies; (2) the collapse of Atlantic has led the finance and consumer loan industry and the Investment Dealers Association of Canada to develop a new improved method of reporting on the activities of finance and consumer loan companies in Canada. Since March 1967, minimum standards of reporting for all finance and consumer loan companies doing business in Canada have been: audited financial statements, appropriate Robert Morris Associates questionnaires, and the Canadian Sales Finance Long Form Report. Since finance companies in Canada are now major intermediaries in both the commercial and financial industries, we conclude that there should be a special Act of Parliament under which their operations are conducted. This Act should be known as the Finance Company Act. There should also be an Inspector of Finance Companies with similar powers to those given the Inspector of Chartered Banks, and finance companies should be brought into a closer working arrangement with the Bank of Canada so that they would be made more responsive to monetary policy. / Business, Sauder School of / Graduate

The goal of my work is to analyze the so-called cyclical companies. In my work I'm going to describe the fuctioning of sectors, which are historically branded as cyclical. In the main part of this work I'm going to evaluate selected companies from the automobile, the air transportation and the electronics sectors.