Planning on a merger or acquisition? Don't forget the data or the people

The best negotiated deal, the most carefully worded contract, will not deliver the desired results if the two entities cannot work together peacefully... and reasonably quickly after the deal is completed. Questions abound. Centralize or maintain distributed systems and synch at intervals - and how?

Getting on with business

We have watched numerous takeovers where incompatible organisations were merged and suddenly required to work together. The effects were at times, chilling.

When the business practices and culture of one organization is imposed on another without proper explanations and training, an uneasy mixture of processes begins to churn. It is imperative to have a "buy-in" from major stake-holders of each group to ensure a smooth transition.

Careful IT planning

BinaryStar believes the number one factor - along with personnel management - that will enable two cultures to be merged effectively, is careful IT planning.

It is never enough to simply replace BigDogs' centralised data centre with FatCats' client/server structure by simply investing in a few hundred PCs and new networks. Instead, the organization must examine how and where its processes and procedures are inter-twined with enterprise applications - the core "stuff", and how much they need to change to benefit both worlds. Getting data to the desktop's of individuals to work more effectively during and after a merger, requires careful and detailed integration planning.

IT incompatibilities can derail or seriously delay a merger. It is imperative that organizations put IT integration planning and modeling, high on the agenda. This can be a unique opportunity to create an efficient, unified IT strategy that offers the best of technology to both merged units.

BinaryStar provides insight and experience in IT integration, migration and data presentation.

    End to end Integration

    Complete end-to-end integration of IT services related to the merging of separate business units or operating divisions.

    Conversions and migrations

    Data conversion and migration between environments, including MS/SQL, Progress, mySQL, DB2, Oracle, Relational, ISAM, Multi-dimensional, Pick/U2, noSQL

    Legacy modernization

    We provide a full range of IT modernization services including user-interface enhancement, electronic data interchange (EDI) automation, security, compliance and audit controls.

    IT Services

    Social Media site development, Wiki support, Data transport and transformation, membership management, Human Resources, software engineering and design, site support