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In this chapter, we want to draw merger and acquisition scholars' attention to the variety of settings investigated under the generic label “M&As”. We seek to answer the following question: “What are the study objects that mergers and acquisitions scholars actually investigate and refer to with the generic label ‘M&As’?” We will achieve this aim by conducting a detailed analysis of existing empirical research published in management journals. Through our analysis, we wish to contribute to the existing literature by examining the complexity and ambiguity behind the label “M&As”, and exploring the variety of research settings where management scholars have, thus far, used it to measure merger and acquisition performance. By doing so, we will raise scholars' awareness of the importance of defining the scope conditions where the merger and acquisition performance construct does or does not apply.

The contribution revisits existing research on human impacts on the performance of mergers and acquisitions. Findings are grouped into three categories: individual-, organizational- and managerial-related factors. Results show that while research seems various and abounding, influential factors are often studied as static setting approached in isolation, without measuring their direct relation to post-acquisition outcomes.

This paper seeks to provide perspectives of HR practitioners based on their experiences with mergers, acquisitions, and/or downsizings.

This qualitative study utilized interviews with 13 HR practitioners. Data were analyzed using a constant comparative method.

HR practitioners were not involved in planning decisions related to downsizings, mergers, and/or acquisition. Neither the practitioners in this study nor other members of the HR team in their organizations had an upfront due diligence role in these change initiatives.

Additional research is needed to guide HRD practitioners in repositioning their roles so that they are more central to an organization's strategic decisions. Given the method of this study, the findings are not intended for generalization to larger populations. Future research should address the needs of HRD practitioners who are affected by downsizings, mergers, and/or acquisitions.

The primary role of HR practitioners need to be more than transitional activities after these change events are announced. Rather, these practitioners need opportunities during the planning stages to ensure that training and development supports the financial goals of these change events. After these change events occur, HRD practitioners need support for interventions to counter the impact of dismissed cultural artifacts and broken human links.

Study participants explained that failure to identify employee issues in the pre‐downsizing due diligence phase creates a chaotic workplace atmosphere and increases employee fears and stress levels. Participants explained how these change events affect career uncertainty, fear, and stress in employees.

Corporate history has featured a number of approaches to restructuring, both internal and external to the firm. External restructuring has taken place through a variety of mechanisms, including mergers, acquisitions, consolidations, divestitures, leveraged buyouts, and spinoffs. Restructuring has been especially prevalent on worldwide basis since the 1980s. In addition to developments in western industrialized economies, the presence of the phenomenon within the world business system has been augmented by the transition of so many previously planned economies to a new market‐based framework.

The proliferation of mergers during the 70s and 80s has generated voluminous amounts of research with a primary focus on the impact to the shareholders from both the acquired and the acquiring firms. Relatively little research has been placed on the valuation process itself, especially within the international merger setting. To fill the void, this article details a valuation process based on capital budgeting. This approach is designed for use by foreign firms contemplating mergers or acquisitions across international borders. The framework may also be used to help explain the increasing numbers of non‐US acquisitions of US firms and to make inferences about divestiture and leveraged buy‐out (LBO) activity.

This paper aims to examine empirically if the encouragement by government policy of merger and acquisition activity involving municipal and provincially owned electricity distribution utilities (LDCs) in the Province of Ontario has had positive effects in terms of value creation, operating performance and economies of scale.

It was anticipated that with LDC consolidation, there will be increased operational efficiency and improvement in the cost-effectiveness of the merged electrical utility. Using matched pairs dependent t-testing and Wilcoxon signed-rank testing, the authors compared data for three years before and after the merger or acquisition of 16 municipal utilities (616 total observations) to determine if there were any statistically significant changes (positive or negative) in measures of financial, operational and service efficiency.

The findings indicate statistically significant increases in debt as a percentage of shareholder equity in post-merger/acquisition utilities and consequently leveraged higher returns on equity. However, there were no statistically significant changes in financial, operational or service efficiency measures (with the exception of decreased efficiency in telephone response).

A total of 16 mergers or acquisitions were reviewed involving 32 of 79 LDCs, with the research implications pointing to a need for existing policy to be reviewed to determine whether a more detailed examination is required by the provincial energy regulator, including a closer examination of managerial motives, before approving mergers between municipal electricity distributors. This research involves only a quantitative approach and further research would examine these transactions using qualitative measures for a deeper examination as to managerial motives.

The results suggest that the mergers or acquisitions to date have served only to increase shareholder risk without improvement in other financial, operational or service efficiencies, a contradiction to the rationale behind the Province’s merger policy.

The consolidation policy for Ontario LDCs has not resulted in any statistically significant improvement in electricity rates or service for consumers.

This paper is the first examination of the effects of Ontario’s LDC consolidation policy in terms of specific financial, operational and service efficiency measures.

The purpose of this chapter is to reflect the impact of mergers and acquisitions processes on performance of Islamic banking industry in the United Kingdom through studying within.

The present research uses explanatory approach in order to examine the research problems, methodology used in the research is quantitative methods through calculating the long-term share prices performance of the UK Islamic banks’ sample. First, the researchers use the control Islamic bank in the event-time approach. The researchers calculate annual abnormal returns using the buy-and-hold abnormal return (BHAR) method over a period of five years, counting from the quarter of a year when the transaction is said to be effective.

The research findings found that there are significant differences in the Islamic mergers and acquisitions post-long-run performance of the UK Islamic banks to the control the crises that face the United Kingdom from 2007 to 2010. However, the acquiring Islamic bank in high-tech industries had a negative effect on their long-term performance.

The present research has been applied for the Islamic banking industry in the United Kingdom after the Western Europe industry from 2007 to 2010.

The main implementations of the present research is valuing UK banks carried out the Islamic mergers and acquisitions of a broad range of management disciplines encompassing the financial, strategic, behavioral, operational, and cross-cultural aspects of this challenging and high-risk activity.

The Islamic mergers and acquisitions have placed a significant amount of value added on the motivation of large banks for engaging in banking mergers and acquisitions’ transactions.

This study aims to research examples of mergers and acquisitions of European and Latvian dairy firms, the motivation for these transactions and their results, and to show that mergers and acquisitions had a positive impact on the development of the dairy industry overall and on specific firms by increasing their competitiveness.

The authors analyze the reasons for, as well as the meaning and impact of, mergers and acquisitions on firm development, focusing on the example of dairy companies in Europe, and subsequently on these processes in Latvian dairy industry.

The study is based on the qualitative and quantitative analysis of firm financial reports as well as reports of the International Dairy Federation, publications of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, annual reports of the International Farm Comparison Network, reports on the dairy industry in the European Union, Latvian Central Union of Dairy Producers, Lursoft firm registry data, as well as reports of the Ministry of Agriculture, and Latvian Farm Consultation and Education center.

The study relies on statistical comparisons of firm operations before mergers or acquisitions as well as during the process and afterwards. This allows identifying the impact of mergers itself on particular firms or the industry, while abstracting from exogenous factors. Mergers and acquisitions in Latvian dairy industry had begun in 2011 and continued until 2013. However, the geopolitical situation in Europe in 2015 had fully offset the positive impact of this process. The deterioration in the geopolitical climate due to developments in Russian–Ukrainian relations has had a big impact on the economic processes affecting the development strategy of dairy firms.

This study finds that often the problems of firm development are related to the lack of financial management especially deficiencies in decision making about firm mergers and acquisitions.

Historical and statistical analysis as well as comparisons of successful experiences in Europe and Latvia allows the authors to conclude that in evaluating decisions on the possibilities for mergers and acquisitions Latvian firms have to be guided by the most important results of this process: possible increases in foreign direct investment and the growth in market share. This will, in turn, give the firms an opportunity to acquire new technologies, reorganize manufacturing processes, and start producing goods with larger value added. Ultimately, this will allow increasing firm values.

Different forms of inter-organisational encounters, including joint ventures, alliances, mergers and acquisitions, have over the last decades become fashionable and much-sought means of globalisation. A continuous concern shared by managers involved in these different forms of inter-organisational encounters is the challenge of making them work in practice – their successful implementation and management. The cultural dimensions of these different kinds of inter-organisational encounters, particularly in cross-border contexts, have been deplored as being particularly difficult. This paper builds on prior research and aims to understand how the cultural dimensions of inter-organisational encounters have been approached by researchers on mergers and acquisitions on the one hand and researchers on alliances and joint ventures on the other hand. Based on a comparative literature review, the findings suggest that the two fields, despite their valuable contributions and the similarities in the phenomena they study, have remained surprisingly isolated from one another and would offer opportunities for cross-fertilisation. Through its theoretical contribution, the paper intends to offer insights to researchers in both streams of research.