IT Transformation in the Context of Mergers & Acquisitions Findings from a Series of Expert Interviews in the German Banking Industry

As today’s information technology (IT) penetrates the business of almost any company, IT transformation of two enterprises during mergers and acquisitions (M&A) represents a challenging task. In particular, the financial service industry inherently relies on IT, supporting their virtual and typically standardized products. The formerly highly fragmented German banking sector currently is and in the future will be subject to M&A activities. Despite the frequent occurrence of M&A, not much literature exists concerning empirically identified and validated concepts, models, and methods for IT transformation. These sources remain either theoretical by depicting analytical approaches not proven in real live, or the presented ideas are characterized by the description of one to three case studies, whose approach is transferable if a certain character of the mergers is assumed. Based on existing literature in the field of M&A, we conducted 15 explorative expert interviews with industry partners from the German banking industry between September and December 2009. The IT architects from banking companies, IT providers for financial institutions, and consultants attending a bank merger revealed useful insights into possible challenges, solutions, and pitfalls during IT transformations. This report summarizes the key findings of the semi-structured interviews. In addition, the findings described are compared with approaches and statements made by existing M&A literature in the field of business as well as IT.