Product details

The merger between Reckitt & Colman and Benckiser, to form Reckitt Benckiser (hereinafter also RB), was completed on 3 December 1999. After the deal, RB became one of the company leader in the household cleaning products with a growing presence in health and personal care. As underlined by Mr. Bart Becht, CEO at Benckiser and appointed CEO of the new Reckitt Benckiser plc, three are the main reasons why M&A are often not reaching their targets and failing to meet shareholders' expectations. Very often the financials and business plans are solid and strategic reasons are robust but the soft elements are usually critical mission and only one out of five M&A is reaching and beating the objectives. In particular the definition of company vision and values, sometime only superficially considered, is causing important short and long term negative effects because of unclear objectives. The case study analyses the above described effect of M&A transactions, aiming to investigate how corporations should act in order to success the post-merger integration phase. The discussion has been thought to be develop during M&A, performance measurement and strategy courses of MBAs and Executive Masters, but also within sessions of Executive Programs.