M&A Strategy & Integration Thesis
Before choosing a target, a board should know what a deal has to deliver and how much integration the business can absorb. We work that out from the operating records.
Questions we help answer
- What would an acquisition have to give us that we could not build ourselves in reasonable time?
- Can our systems, finance team and management absorb another business this year?
- Which of our platforms would an acquired business have to move onto, and what would that involve?
- How will we measure whether a deal delivered what the board approved?
- Should we buy, build or partner to reach this capability?
What we do
Operating objectives for M&A
The capabilities, markets, channels or customers the business needs from inorganic growth, written as operating requirements with the measure each would move.
Integration capacity assessment
An honest read of whether the business's systems, data, finance close and management time can carry an integration, and what would need to be in place first.
Integration thesis
For a deal the client is considering, how the two businesses would combine operationally, which records must join and which benefits depend on which system changes.
Build, buy or partner comparison
The operating requirements of each route compared on time, systems work and management effort, as input to the board's decision and its advisers' work.
- How an engagement with THEFOCUS startsDiscuss this with us
How we approach it
- 01
Start from the acquirer's own records
Integration capacity is read from the acquirer's close timetable, system architecture and current change load.
- 02
Write the thesis as joins and dependencies
Every benefit in an integration thesis names the records that must join and the system change it depends on.
- 03
Leave deal judgment with the board and its advisers
We supply operating evidence and the integration view. The decision to proceed, and the price, belong to the board and its regulated advisers.
Relevant industries
How an engagement with THEFOCUS starts
A first conversation is about your situation. If there is a fit, we propose a scoped diagnostic with a fixed deliverable before any larger commitment.
Discuss this with us01
A working conversation
Forty-five minutes with the person who would lead the work. We ask about the decision, the systems behind it and the deadline.
02
A scoped diagnostic
Read-only access, a fixed timeframe and a written finding: what the records show, what it costs and what to change first.
03
A plan you can act on
Changes, owners, measures and exclusions in writing. The same team then builds and measures, or hands over cleanly.
- One accountable team
- The people who diagnose also build the systems and measure the result.
- Partners chosen per problem
- Independent specializts join for the parts that need them, under one contract.
- Records before dashboards
- Orders, ledgers and logs are reconciled before any recommendation depends on them.
Questions executives ask
Will you tell us whether to buy a particular company?
No. We do not make deal recommendations or give investment advice. We set out what an acquisition would need to achieve operationally and what integrating it would involve, for the board and its advisers to weigh.
Is this the same as commercial due diligence?
No. We do not prepare due-diligence reports for lenders or investors. This work is for the acquirer's own planning of integration and operating objectives.
Discuss this with us
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