The following article is Part A of a study by the M&A Research Centre at Cass Business School and Intralinks, our community Partner.

Download the Masters of the Deal: Part 1: Learning from the best performers report

This research study seeks to investigate two separate but related areas. Part 1, whose findings are described in this report, tries to identify the drivers of shareholder value creation from the merger and acquisition (M&A) activity of an extremely large sample of global publicly listed companies over the past 20 years. Part 2, which will be released as a report in early 2015, examines the M&A strategies of an elite group of M&A-active corporate outperformers – companies that have demonstrated sustained, above average shareholder value creation (known as “excellent corporate portfolio managers”, or ECPMs) – to try to determine if this group share common attributes and behaviours, and to identify what those are.

In conjunction with this research, interviews with 30 C-level and senior executives working within some of these high-performing companies were conducted by Remark. These professionals, working at companies that have some of the best records of shareholder value creation from M&A, offer their expertise and provide context to the findings.

Download the Masters of the Deal: Part 1: Learning from the best performers report

What you can expect to learn from this piece: