Analysis of company: Aerospace Matra (2006)

Aerospace is the common name of Societe Nationale Industrielle Aerospatiale. Aerospace was formed in 1970 from the merger of three companies: North - Aviation, Sud Aviation, and SEREB. Its activity consisted in the construction of airplanes, helicopters, tactical missiles and missile systems and space.

Matra Hautes Technologies (MHT) was established in 1995 as part of Lagardere Group. This division brought together the activities and Defense Systems Command, Space and Telecommunications. In 1999, there was the merger between Aerospatiale and Matra Hautes Technologies that gave birth to Aerospatiale Matra.

With this merger, a group of 52 000 employees were born, who ranked second in Europe and fifth worldwide in the industrial sector of aeronautics and space. Now, Aerospatiale Matra no longer exists as such since it merged in 2000 with Daimler Chrysler Aerospace AG and CASA to give birth to EADS.

The merger between Aerospatiale and Matra Hautes Technologies (MHT) is the focus of our study. The announcement of the merger between Aerospatiale and MHT was held in the summer of 1998, after the declaration of Heads of State and Government on December 9, 1997 concerning the business combination of European aerospace and defense.

The economic theory of expertise has been developed to provide answers to the problems posed by the intervention of experts in a relationship. In a merger – acquisition, experts have a mediating role and must work in a context of asymmetric information. They must make reliable information disclosed by one party to another to ensure the accuracy of the resulting assessment.

The involvement of experts in mergers – acquisition, and in particular during the phase of due diligence, generally tends to make negotiations easier when partners do not have the same degree of knowledge.

The procurement risk is the risk to the shareholders of the acquiring firm that are exposed. The value of the securities they own may fall as "their" company decides to move closer to another. There is also a risk to the shareholders of the selling firm to see their shares undervalued.

The merger – acquisition by agreement based on cooperation among potential partners and among the leaders is all the more important.

Tags: Aerospace Matra, origin of Aerospace Matra, merger between Aerospatiale and Matra Hautes Technologies