The seller's perspective on acquisition success: Empirical evidence from the communications equipment industry

This paper considers acquisition success from the seller's perspective and uses the seller's acquisition success criteria as an indication of their interpretation of the acquisition event. The argument is that sellers who use strategic and social criteria to appraise acquisition success interpret acquisitions as partnerships, while sellers who use financial criteria to appraise success interpret acquisitions as sales. Based on interview and survey data on the seller's perspective on acquisition success for 33 acquisitions in the communications equipment industry, we find that sellers use strategic and social criteria to appraise acquisition success and conclude that sellers interpret acquisitions as partnerships.