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DEGREE REGULATIONS & PROGRAMMES OF STUDY 2024/2025

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DRPS : Course Catalogue : Business School : Common Courses (Management School)

Postgraduate Course: Mergers and Acquisitions (CMSE11458)

Course Outline
SchoolBusiness School CollegeCollege of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences
Credit level (Normal year taken)SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) AvailabilityNot available to visiting students
SCQF Credits10 ECTS Credits5
SummaryThis course is suitable for students with postgraduate-level backgrounds in corporate finance and financial markets and provides students with the necessary skills to understand the strategic potential and limitations of mergers and acquisitions, their value creation potential, as well as the role of markets and institutions within the same framework. The course is designed to provide students with the necessary grounding in theory, as well as applied and organisational skills, to demonstrate that they will be successful in related career paths.
Course description The course aims to deliver students, at a rigorous level, the several and important issues on mergers and acquisitions (M&As). In particular, the course aims to develop students' ability to critically understand and evaluate issues relevant to M&As. The course relies on in-depth issues in corporate finance, such as capital structure, and covers the most recent developments from theoretical and empirical perspectives.

Outline Content

Course content includes merger waves, acquisition strategies and motives, target firm valuation, structuring acquisitions and negotiations, anti-trust issues, investment banker perspective, M&A value creation.

Student Learning Experience

Students will have to read the core texts that will support the learning outcomes of each topic/lecture, and also most of the additional references/readings that will accompany each topic. The weekly lectures will explore particular aspects of the course and the additional readings will attempt to help students put material in context, which will not substitute the core reading.

During lectures students will be asked to be active, completing exercises and discussing issues with their fellow students. In any case, the nature of the material means that in most cases there is not a single acceptable answer. The important aspect is students to be able to argue on a case and present compelling evidence to back their argument.
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
Pre-requisites Co-requisites
Prohibited Combinations Other requirements None
Course Delivery Information
Academic year 2024/25, Not available to visiting students (SS1) Quota:  None
Course Start Block 3 (Sem 2)
Timetable Timetable
Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) Total Hours: 100 ( Lecture Hours 10, Seminar/Tutorial Hours 2, Supervised Practical/Workshop/Studio Hours 2, Summative Assessment Hours 2, Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2, Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours 82 )
Assessment (Further Info) Written Exam 100 %, Coursework 0 %, Practical Exam 0 %
Additional Information (Assessment) 100% Written Exam (Individual) - Assesses all course Learning Outcomes
Feedback Formative: Feedback will be provided throughout the course.

Summative: Feedback will be provided on assessment within agreed deadlines.
Exam Information
Exam Diet Paper Name Hours & Minutes
Main Exam Diet S2 (April/May) Mergers and Acquisitions (CMSE11458)2:00
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
  1. Discuss the theoretical foundations of mergers and acquisitions.
  2. Discuss the valuation principles and practices of M&As and rationalise success potential.
  3. Value target firms and estimate the potential synergies arising from M&As.
  4. Contrast empirical methodologies that aim to capture value creation from M&As.
  5. Show ability to negotiate the various terms of M&As and show knowledge around re-negotiation options based on risk-management tools.
Reading List
Required:
-Sudarsanam, S. 2010. Creating Value from Mergers and Acquisitions: The Challenges, Prentice Hall - Pearson.
-Arzac, R.E., 2008. Valuation for Mergers, Buyouts and Restructuring, Wiley.

Recommended:
-Bruner, F.R., 2004. Applied Mergers and Acquisitions, Wiley.
-Gaughan, P.A., 2010. Mergers, Acquisitions, and Corporate Restructurings, Wiley.
-DePamphilis, D., 2013. Mergers, Acquisitions, and Other Restructuring Activities, Academic Press.
-Tirole, J., 2006. The Theory of Corporate Finance, Princeton U. Press.
Additional Information
Graduate Attributes and Skills Knowledge and understanding:
-A critical understanding of the historical patterns, building blocks, motives, valuation models, negotiation tactics, and other important concepts of mergers and acquisitions (M&As).

Practice: Applied knowledge, skills and understanding:
-Build a strategic business plan that assesses the value and feasibility of M&As to reshape the modern corporation.
-Build on the most up-to-dated valuation techniques that help in evaluating firms and synergies in the context of M&As.
-Develop and in-depth knowledge of the sensitivities across inputs in the valuation models of M&As.
KeywordsNot entered
Contacts
Course organiserDr Leonidas Barbopoulos
Tel:
Email: Leonidas.Barbopoulos@ed.ac.uk
Course secretaryMiss Ellen Hunter
Tel:
Email: Ellen.Hunter@ed.ac.uk
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