Book Description
With acquisition activity running into the trillions of dollars, the acquisition alternative continues to be the favorite corporate growth strategy of this generation's executives. Unfortunately, creating shareholder value remains the most elusive outcome of these corporate strategies. After decades of research and billions of dollars paid in advisory fees, why do these major decisions continue to destroy value?
Building on his groundbreaking research first cited in Business Week, Mark L. Sirower explains how companies often pay too much -- and predictably never realize the promises of increased performance and competitiveness -- in their quest to acquire other companies. Armed with extensive evidence, Sirower destroys the popular notion that the acquisition premium represents potential value. He provides the first formal and functional definition for synergy -- the specific increases in performance beyond those already expected for companies to achieve independently. Sirower's refreshing nuts-and-bolts analysis of the fundamentals behind acquisition performance cuts sharply through the existing folklore surrounding failed acquisitions, such as lack of "strategic fit" or corporate culture problems, and gives managers the tools to avoid predictable losses in acquisition decisions.
Using several detailed examples of recent major acquisitions and through his masterful integration and extension of techniques from finance and business strategy, Sirower reveals:
The unique business gamble that acquisitions represent The managerial challenges already embedded in current stock prices The competitive conditions that must be met and the organizational cornerstones that must be in place for any possibility of synergy The precise Required Performance Improvements (RPIs) implicitly embedded in acquisition premiums and the reasons why these RPIs normally dwarf realistic performance gains The seductiveness and danger of sophisticated valuation models so often used by advisers The Synergy Trap is the first exposé of its kind to prove that the tendency of managers to succumb to the "up the ante" philosophy in acquisitions often leads to disastrous ends for their shareholders. Sirower shows that companies must meticulously plan -- and account for huge uncertainties -- before deciding to enter the acquisition game. To date, Sirower's work is the most comprehensive and rigorous, yet practical, analysis of the drivers of acquisition performance. This definitive book will become required reading for managers, corporate directors, consultants, investors, bankers, and academics involved in the mergers and acquisitions arena.
Average Customer Review:
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
A must read for valuation analysts, 2003-09-26
Excellent scholarly work. Control premiums are assumed and not supported by empirical evidence. The Synergy Trap is packed with statistical evidence to support the enfluence of the auction or "bidding" process that heavily enfluences stock prices during acquisitions and takeovers.
4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
Packed With Knowledge!, 2001-09-01
Mark L. Sirower's thought-provoking and complex book is actually a critically acclaimed academic study that challenges the reasoning behind corporate acquisitions. Pointing out that acquisitions usually devalue the acquiring companies (a loss from which they rarely recover), Sirower delves into management fundamentals and mathematical analyses to get to the bottom of merger and acquisition problems. Three detailed appendices feature plenty of financial calculations, performance measures and data from various corporate acquisitions to back up his assertions. We [...] recommend this book to those involved in mergers and acquisitions and to other readers intrigued by the inside view of this "carnivorous quest."
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
The Acquisition Game, 2000-05-28
Dr. Sirower does a remarkable job in showing how easy it is to lose the acquisition game by failing to define synergy in terms of real, measurable improvement in competitive advantage. By analysing the acquisition premium with his Required Performance Improvement (RPI) formula, Dr. Sirower shows how to determine in advance when the price is far above the potential value of an acquisition. The way managers who analyse the acquisition premium and concept of synergy can avoid to get caught and how to predict the probability of shareholder losses or gains (although the probability formula is not flawless). Regardless the good work done by Dr. Sirower, I wouldn't be surprised if M&A professionals don't like the book because of its highly critical approach to synergie effects.
15 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
Interesting reading about how synergy can be a trap, 1999-10-27
This is a very easy to read book about how easy you can fall into the trap of paying a high premium for a company without having any concrete plans for how to achive the value gains through the value chain. He describes with some very good examples how to fall into the trap if you dont have a number of conerstones in place before the acquisition. The major cornerstones of synergy are stratigic vision, operating strategy, system integration and power&culture. These four cornerstones are linked closely together.Chapter three has a discussion about the premium that the acquirer pay.
Part two in the book is an analysis of corporate acquisition strategies. In this analysis i didn't find anything new that I didn't know in advance
So my conclusion would be: an easy to read book with some very good examples of how wrong it can go (eg. sears, AT&T, Time Warner TBS,...), and he put a lot of emphasis on the importance of having the cornerstones of synergy in place before the acquisition as well as a discussion of competitor reations to acquisitions.