Do Acquirer Capabilities Affect Acquisition Performance? Examining Strategic and Effectiveness Capabilities in Acquirers

This paper examines acquisition performance from the perspective of acquirer capabilities. It argues that the strategic capabilities underpinning a firm’s competitive strategy can be utilized to create economic value in acquisitions. Acquirers with strong cost leadership capabilities are expected to leverage these capabilities to reduce post-acquisition costs as they integrate acquisition targets. Acquirers with strong differentiation capabilities are expected to utilize their strategic capabilities to increase post-acquisition revenues by improving branding, product design, sales, and services in their targets. We also explore the affect of an acquirer’s effectiveness capabilities on acquisition performance. Lastly, we examine how acquirer’s organize these capabilities, either at the business unit or corporate-level, in order to maximize their affect on acquisition performance. Based on a sample of 204 horizontal acquisitions occurring in the banking industry, we find support for the link between acquirer cost leadership capabilities and post-acquisition cost reduction. Acquirer effectiveness capabilities are associated with improvements in post-acquisition revenues and profitability. We conclude that a better understanding of the competitive capabilities of acquirers is important to understanding acquisition performance. This contributes directly to horizontal acquisition research, but can be extended to several areas of strategy research on M&As including: diversifying acquisitions, acquirer experience, and how acquirers can avoid “synergy traps”.Acquisitions ; Acquirer Capabilities ; Strategic Capabilities ; Effectiveness Capabilities ; Acquisition Performance

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Probing QCD approach to thermal equilibrium with ultrahigh energy cosmic rays

The Pierre Auger Collaboration has reported an excess in the number of muons of a few tens of percent over expectations computed using extrapolation of hadronic interaction models tuned to accommodate LHC data. Very recently, we proposed an explanation for the muon excess assuming the formation of a deconfined quark matter (fireball) state in central collisions of ultrarelativistic cosmic rays with air nuclei. At the first stage of its evolution the fireball contains gluons as well as $u$ and $d$ quarks. The very high baryochemical potential inhibits gluons from fragmenting into $u \bar u$ and $d \bar d$, and so they fragment predominantly into $s \bar s$ pairs. In the hadronization which follows this leads to the strong suppression of pions and hence photons, but allows heavy hadrons to be emitted carrying away strangeness. In this manner, the extreme imbalance of hadron to photon content provides a way to enhance the muon content of the air shower. In this communication we study theoretical systematics from hadronic interaction models used to describe the cascades of secondary particles produced in the fireball explosion. We study the predictions of one of the leading LHC-tuned models QGSJET II-04 considered in the Auger analysis.Comment: 7 pages LaTeX, 6 .pdf figure

The Cepheid Distance Scale: recent progress in fundamental techniques

This review examines progress on the Pop I, fundamental-mode Cepheid distance scale with emphasis on recent developments in geometric and quasi-geometric techniques for Cepheid distance determination. Specifically I examine the surface brightness method, interferometric pulsation method, and trigonometric measurements. The three techniques are found to be in excellent agreement for distance measures in the Galaxy. The velocity p-factor is of crucial importance in the first two of these methods. A comparison of recent determinations of the p-factor for Cepheids demonstrates that observational measures of p and theoretical predictions agree within their uncertainties for Galactic Cepheids.Comment: An invited review at the Santa Fe, NM, conference -- Stellar Pulsation: Challenges for Theory and Observation; May 31-June 5, 2009 10 pages, 8 figure

Brascamp-Lieb Inequality and Its Reverse: An Information Theoretic View

We generalize a result by Carlen and Cordero-Erausquin on the equivalence between the Brascamp-Lieb inequality and the subadditivity of relative entropy by allowing for random transformations (a broadcast channel). This leads to a unified perspective on several functional inequalities that have been gaining popularity in the context of proving impossibility results. We demonstrate that the information theoretic dual of the Brascamp-Lieb inequality is a convenient setting for proving properties such as data processing, tensorization, convexity and Gaussian optimality. Consequences of the latter include an extension of the Brascamp-Lieb inequality allowing for Gaussian random transformations, the determination of the multivariate Wyner common information for Gaussian sources, and a multivariate version of Nelson's hypercontractivity theorem. Finally we present an information theoretic characterization of a reverse Brascamp-Lieb inequality involving a random transformation (a multiple access channel).Comment: 5 pages; to be presented at ISIT 201

Detrital-zircon geochronology and provenance of the Ocloyic synorogenic clastic wedge, and Ordovician accretion of the Argentine Precordillera terrane

The Precordillera terrane in northwestern Argentina is interpreted to be anexotic (Laurentian) continental fragment that was accreted to western Gondwanaduring the Ordovician. One prominent manifestation of the subductionand collision process is a Middle?Upper Ordovician clastic wedge, which overliesa passive-margin carbonate-platform succession in the Precordillera. U/Pbages of detrital zircons from sandstones within the clastic wedge, as well as zirconsfrom clasts within conglomerates, provide documentation for the compositionof the sediment provenance. The ages of detrital zircons are consistentvertically through the succession, as well as laterally along and across strike ofthe Precordillera, indicating a single, persistent sediment source throughoutdeposition of the clastic wedge. The dominant mode (~1350?1000 Ma) of thedetrital-zircon ages corresponds to the ages of basement rocks in the WesternSierras Pampeanas along the eastern side of the Precordillera. A secondarymode (1500?1350 Ma) corresponds in age to the Granite-Rhyolite province ofLaurentia, an age range which is not known in ages of basement rocks of theWestern Sierras Pampeanas; however, detritus from Granite-Rhyolite-age rocksin the basement of the Precordillera was available through recycling of synriftand passive-margin cover strata. Igneous clasts in the conglomerates haveages (647?614 Ma) that correspond to the ages of minor synrift igneous rocks inthe nearby basement massifs; the same ages are represented in a minor mode(~750?570 Ma) of detrital-zircon ages. A quartzite clast in a conglomerate, aswell as parts of the population of detrital zircons, indicates the importanceof a source in the metasedimentary cover of the leading edge of the Precordillera.The Famatina continental-margin magmatic arc reflects pre-collisionsubduction of Precordillera lithosphere beneath the western Gondwana margin;however, no detrital zircons have ages that correspond to Famatina arcmagmatism, indicating that sedimentary detritus from the arc may have beentrapped in a forearc basin and did not reach the foreland. The indicators ofsedimentary provenance for the foreland deposits are consistent with subductionof the Precordillera beneath western Gondwana, imbrication of basementrocks from either the Precordillera or Gondwana into an accretionary complex,and recycling of deformed Precordillera cover rocks.Fil: Thomas, William A.. Geological Survey of Alabama; Estados UnidosFil: Astini, Ricardo Alfredo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Centro de Investigaciones en Ciencias de la Tierra. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas Físicas y Naturales. Centro de Investigaciones en Ciencias de la Tierra; ArgentinaFil: Mueller, Paul A.. Florida State University; Estados UnidosFil: McClelland, William C.. University of Iowa; Estados Unido

Extremely alpha-Enriched Globular Clusters in Early-Type Galaxies: A Step towards the Dawn of Stellar Populations?

We compare [alpha/Fe], metallicity, and age distributions of globular clusters in elliptical, lenticular, and spiral galaxies, which we derive from Lick line index measurements. We find a large number of globular clusters in elliptical galaxies that reach significantly higher [alpha/Fe] values (>0.5) than any clusters in lenticular and spiral galaxies. Most of these extremely alpha-enriched globular clusters are old (t > 8 Gyr) and cover the metallicity range -1 <~ [Z/H] <~ 0. A comparison with supernova yield models suggests that the progenitor gas clouds of these globular clusters must have been predominantly enriched by massive stars (>~20 M_sol) with little contribution from lower-mass stars. The measured [alpha/Fe] ratios are also consistent with yields of very massive pair-instability supernovae (~130-190 M_sol). Both scenarios imply that the chemical enrichment of the progenitor gas was completed on extremely short timescales of the order of a few Myr. Given the lower [alpha/Fe] average ratios of the diffuse stellar population in early-type galaxies, our results suggest that these extremely alpha-enhanced globular clusters could be members of the very first generation of star clusters formed, and that their formation epochs would predate the formation of the majority of stars in giant early-type galaxies.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journa