The headlines are filled with the sorry tales of companies like Vivendi and AOL Time Warner that tried to use mergers and acquisitions to grow big fast or transform fundamentally weak business models. But, drawing on extensive data and experience, Bain's David Harding and Sam Rovit conclude that major deals make sense in only two circumstances: when they reinforce a company's existing basis of competition or when they help a company make the shift, as the industry's competitive base changes.
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Read more about this topic in David Harding and Sam Rovit's book Mastering the Merger
