CHALLENGES AND STAKES OF THE POST-ACQUISITION INTEGRATION
                        PROCESS

                                  Mariana Vancea, University of Oradea


ABSTRACT: Over the last few decades mergers and the acquisitions, both the international and the
national ones, have become strategic instruments of growth and development of enterprises. A sensible
aspect regarding the merger or the acquisition operations is that of integrating the entities had in view.
Because it is considered that the high rate of the failure of the operations is due to unsuccessful
integration of the entities, we have decided to identify the challenges occurring in this phase and the
factors influencing mostly the integration process. Our research tackles aspects regarding the
challenges resulting from a merger or acquisition operation, within the integration phase of the entities
involved. Thus, we analysed the importance of the human and cultural factors and the challenges
resulting from this integration process, for we consider that these factors have a strong impact on the
post-acquisition performance and they can ensure the success of the integration. We found that the
acquiring firms are affected by changes during the integration process, by retaining the important
resources, the transfer of resources from or to the acquired firms and by eliminating the redundant
resources. Yet, in the integration phase, the problems may occur due to human factors, cultural
incompatibility and an inappropriate management of the integration process.

Key words: mergers and acquisitions, post-acquisition integration, organizational culture, human capital

JEL codes: M10, M14