Ellen Elisabeth Altenborg

Kulturdepartementet

The Academy of Management Conference 2004

Is equality a sustainable principle in mergers? This paper explores how the equality principle led to a failure to merge. In the merger and acquisition literature equality is regarded as an important principle to facilitate integration and to symbolise that the members of both organisations will be treated fairly and with respect. However, defining and implementing the equality principle can be more challenging and difficult than previously noted in the merger and acquisition literature. Moreover, the principle may have the reverse effect on integration. Studying a failed merger between two state-owned, Nordic telecom companies, we find that the equality principle led to a disintegration of the two corporations. This disintegration happened as a result of constant attempts to renegotiate the distribution of outcomes, reinforcement of national boundaries in the merger process, decision paralysis in the top management team and postponement of crucial decisions.

Nordiske Företagsekonomiske Ämeskonferensen 2001

The aim of this paper is to explore why the merger between the two telecom companies, Telia and Telenor, failed. This merger was presented and assessed by the business press as a strategically sound merger, but was broken off shortly after the deal was signed. A substantial amount of literature in the merger and acquisition field has investigated reasons for failure in terms of under-performing mergers and acquisitions. However, there is a lack of research focusing on why deals are called off. We use a combination of an insider and outsider perspective to explore this failure and base our findings on observations, interviews and documentation. To explain why the merger failed, the paper points to a number of factors including multiple motives and stakeholders, misfit between corporate strategies, a long period of leadership vacuum and the difficulties in managing a merger between equals.

Magma forskning og viten Doi: https://doi.org/10.23865/magma.v1.37