Achieving Corporate Growth Through Mergers and Acquisitions The Experience Of Lever Brothers Nigeria PLC.

Abstract

The incidence of Mergers and Acquisitions in Nigeria is a recent phenomen The best known case to-date is that of lever Brothers Nigeria PLC and Lipt Nigeria Limited. However this is not to say that there have not been prior a other successful cases of mergers and Acquisitions in Nigeria. Not withstanding the apparent success of the previous experiments in Merg and Acquisitions, the arrangement is still not very popular in Nigeria. Ma enterpreneurs tend against Mergers and Acquisitions because they believe t A it is impracticable in Nigeria. Others think that one of Nigeria's major busin- handicap is the inability to work together through strategic alliances. Thus many business firms in the country are obsessed with the idea of cutting niche for themselves by depending solely on internal funds to finance th growth and expansion. When retained earnings becomes inadequate a 1 external funding becomes inevitable, they have had to resort to raising sa albeit at prohibitive cost, from the banks or through recapitalisation. Howev the high implicit cost of these sources of external funds often has a negat' impact on many firm's growth objectives. Recent happenings in the Nigerian business sector, especially in the financ sector, have forced businesses to begin to reconsider Mergers and Acquisiti as a means of achieving corporate growth and expansion. Achieving Corporate Growth Through Mergers and Acquisitions