A top player in the Brazilian Health Sector (open capital, with more than 4m members and+20 hospitals), with strong background in M&A, acquired one of their main competitors – increasing members by 25%, and the network by one large hospital and  ~20 medical centers. Although the client was experienced in acquisitions, the integration was complex – incorporating a family-owned company, with a different integration strategy, and different business model, from which synergies and best practices needed to be identified. The target of the integration was to increase revenue by ~$250m/year and capture ~$56m in synergies in a 2-year horizon.

We supported the integration of the two organizations by coordinating specialist teams to identify business models’ differentials and best practices, managing internal expectations to speed-up results without putting the main strategy at risk, implementing a clear decision making governance, and mapping talents from the acquired company to ensure retention. After the take over and initial integration, our client’s decision was to accelerate the full integration by 2 years, to be completed by the end of year 1. We worked with the client’s team from the takeover preparation and execution of the first 100 days’ integration, to supporting targeted, strategic projects which enabled synergy capture.

Full Integration achieved in year 1 – with first year results in Revenue and EBITDA achieved – retention of key employees, successful management of the network optimization (consolidation of 3 key hospitals across networks, becoming one of the top 5 hospitals in Brazil following process and infrastructure improvements), merge of call centre operations into a third party, and merge of clients and members.

A global food organization acquired a family-owned Brazilian business as part of its expansion into emerging markets. The strength of the acquired business portfolio, including sales and distribution, combined with the know-how and capabilities of the global organization, created an opportunity for business expansion in Brazil.

The focus of the PMI was on the human aspects of the integration: the strategy was to integrate the companies, taking advantage of best practices and synergies, while preserving the strengths and culture of the family-owned business.

Integration’s approach was based on defining a clear end-state vision from which the longer-term roadmap was built, designing the new organizational structure, understanding cultural differences and incorporating them in communication, creating a customized talent and retention package and implementing an effective stakeholder-management process throughout the integration.

Successful communication to more than 3,500 employees, zero negative impacts to clients or the market, new organizational governance and structure launched on Day One and structured integration roadmap with a clear path to combining the strengths of both business units.

An organization specializing in prepaid corporate services, and operating across 42 countries, made a strategic alliance with one of the largest players in Brazil to become the market leader in fleet management of light trucks and cars. This joint venture represented the largest investment in the history of the organization, turning Brazil into a hugely important operation for the group.

The project challenge was to make the JV operational from Day One, considering two simultaneous spin offs and mergers.

Integration worked as a Clean Team to design the operational model, commercial strategies, remuneration equalization drivers, synergies identification, internal and external communication management and organized the closing preparation.

Given the confidentiality, size of the deal, legal criticality (evaluated by the Competitions Agency), and the cultural differences between the two organizations, we created a unique project governance and workfront arrangement that involved more than 30 consultants and 50 top executives across the two clients. Due to the importance of systems integration (not under Integration responsibility) we ensured as a PMO that all work fronts were closely aligned with the system needs/architecture to protect full service continuity.

As result the organization was able to operate JV from Day One, without sales disruption, with a minimum approval period process from the antitrust regulators and with no restrictions – credited by legal advisors as the result of an efficient Clean Team with knowledge and respect of legal regulations during the process.

We achieved an operational integration in record time – two months for core finance processes, accounting and systems interfaces, and synergies which would increment % profitability by more than 5p.p were confirmed, with clear implementation leaders.

As a result of well-planned external communications, client attrition was reduced to lower than expected levels and brand image recognition improved.

Our client, a multinational toy retailer, had been focused on sustaining growth in home markets (UKI) when an opportunity arose to acquire the Central European divisions of a key competitor. This was the first acquisition the client had made, and roughly doubled their revenue and number of stores.

Integration was asked to support several challenges the client was facing after execution had already begun – uncertainty among leadership on the progress towards key milestones, a 4 month delay in a major IT go-live, a lack of project plan and structure, misalignment between teams, a clash in organizational cultures and a tight timeline for go-lives and TSA exit.

Integration worked closely with key employees from both sides of the business to understand the most critical issues and needs, providing Program Management support to the execution, to accelerate progress towards key milestones and drive complex changes to deliver exit-TSA commitments under an extremely tight timeline.

In parallel, we brought change management support to help in the initial period of the integration between both businesses, running a program focused on codifying and embedding a new corporate culture.

Our support enabled a smooth and swift transition which delivered:

• Successful on-time critical go-lives e.g. SAP, WMS, new e-commerce;
• full store rebranding;
• store hardware change;
• back-end system autonomy prior to TSA exit deadline;
• significant progress in deployment of business model (changes in stores and multiple core functions);
• new organizational structure to reflect new culture and ways of working; and
• effective communication leading to much greater collaboration across teams.