"The corporate brand is not only used to improve competitive
positioning and express company aspirations, it can also be a powerful
tool to motivate employees."
This is no doubt how shareholders of Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group feel Monday morning after Hertz agreed to up the price it is willing to pay for the rental giant to $50 from $41.
Jun 01
2010
China acquisitions of foreign companies reach new record
China has increased its appetite for foreign companies.
Outbound acquisitions by Chinese companies have swelled five times to $28.4 billion so far this year (as of May 24) compared with $5.8 billion during the same period last year, according to Thomson Reuters.
In a somewhat unusual deal involving two of the handful of global hedge fund firms that are publicly-traded, London's Man Group plc is buying London-based GLG Partners for about $1.6 billion, resulting in a money management firm with about $63 billion under management.
Under the terms of the deal, GLG's shareholders will receive $4.50 per share in cash.
One of the benefits of an economy like the one we are experiencing, is the opportunities it creates. For companies with strong balance sheets and lots of cash, this could mean the opportunity to buy a competitor, or create JV's to build market share and revenue. But, as with anything in business, there are risks, and the key to paying the right price and getting the right ROI is not a numbers game. Rather, it is driven completely by the people in the organization and the leadership that drives the strategy. In a study by KPMG (Unlocking Shareholder Value: The Keys to Success, November 1999), 83% of mergers were unsuccessful in producing any business benefits with regards to shareholder value.
As the VP of Growth for GE Consumer Finance, my team and I were acutely aware of how important a company's culture, leadership and organization structure was to securing a successful deal. My role was to make sure we captured the synergies from a people perspective, outlining the cost of severance, benefits, pension liabilities, and CIC payouts, as well as assessing the leadership team and cultural fit with GE. Of course there was the financial due diligence that our finance team managed, but it was only one input into the equation. GE had a very rigid 100 day integration plan that was well documented, and required the purchased company to migrate over to our systems and processes almost immediately.
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