A Marketing Perspective on Mergers and Acquisitions : How Marketing Integration Affects Postmerger Performance

Previous research on mergers and acquisitions (M&A) has neglected marketing issues by and large. This paper examines the effects of post merger integration (PMI) in marketing (ex tent and speed of marketing integration) on M&A performance mediated by integration outcomes (magnitude of cost savings and market-related performance). Results from a survey of 232 horizontal mergers and acquisitions show that market-related performance after the merger or acquisition has a much stronger impact on the financial performance after a merger or acquisition than cost savings. Also, extent of integration is found to be beneficial in terms of cost savings, but detrimental in terms of market-related performance. Finally, the study identifies a number of variables that moderate the relationships under consideration