Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Symantec Corporation: Acquiring Entrepreneurial Companies

1998; RELX Group (Netherlands); Linguagem: Inglês

1556-5068

Thomas Hellmann,

Private Equity and Venture Capital

Key words: acquisition, entrepreneurial finance, strategic investment, organizational integration Setting: Symantec Corporation, 1996 , computer industry Symantec Corporation has a competitive position that allows it to market and distribute a variety of software. It's strategy is not to rely solely on internal development of new products, but also to acquire entrepreneurial companies with innovative technologies that have not yet reached significant market presence. The case examines the company's process of managing acquisition. There are three main phases, prospecting deals, doing the due diligence and deal structuring, and managing the integration. The case examines this process both from the perspective of Symantec, and from the perspective of two of the companies that were acquired. The case emphasizes the importance of anticipating and managing the organizational changes that are necessary to create the incremental value that would make the acquisition worthwhile. It also emphasizes that some of the conflicts between the acquiring and the acquired companies are inevitable. For example, in both of the acquired companies examined in the case study the founders left the company shortly after the acquisition.