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Private Equity and leveraged buyouts have become common in Europe, including in particular Germany. They are a catalyst for corporate restructuring and growth. Over time, financial investors have started to exit their investments. The development of some former LBOs raises the question whether the financial investors traded lo- term growth against short-term cash flow and expropriated value. Financial investors are further accused of reducing employment, cutting salaries, offshoring production, and leaving companies financially instable. Researchers have questioned the sustainability of performance improvement and tested changes in performance indicators. The findings confirm that the financial performance of former LBOs declines. The decline occurs with a time lag, but research fails to explain in detail its determinants of this decline. In particular, the decline seems to be caused by increase strategy diversification, the recurrence of inefficiencies and reduced management focus on efficiency. These observations are limited to companies that exit through a public offering, not through a trade sale. This study seeks to enhance completeness and precision of research into the post-exit period. Given the secrecy of the industry, no empirical data has been gathered that in detail analyses how the way the LBOs are supervised and managed changes at the exit. Research on the subsequent changes in strategy and operations is sparse and limited to those companies pursuing a public offering. A greater understanding of the source of performance development requires further plowing through major corporate activities.
List of contents
and Founding Theory.- Model Building and Hypotheses Development.- Empirical Part.- Synthesis and Outlook.
About the author
Dr. Richard K. Lenz completed his doctoral thesis at the Center for Entrepreneurial and Financial Studies at the Technical University Munich.
Summary
The current financial crisis has intensified the discussion around buyouts and the related value creation of financial investors. Richard K. Lenz analyses how LBOs evolve after the financial investors have exited. Based on three case studies of former LBOs in Germany, he shows that performance decline is often related to the weakening of the former performance-enhancing series of governance instruments. The author reveals that management starts to over-emphasize growth while improvements on the micro-level of the company are robust and allow outperforming competitors. Finally, he concludes that performance decline seems to be rather due to inconsistent interests and less monitoring by new shareholders than to wealth transfer towards financial investors.
Foreword
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