This book chapter examines the role of target screening in acquisitions, highlighting its crucial impact on strategic outcomes. Despite its importance, target screening receives limited managerial and research focus. Many companies struggle to identify suitable targets, often due to reliance on heuristics that simplify but also bias the process. Managers tend to narrow the search scope to accelerate decision-making, inadvertently restricting options. Later screening stages prioritize financial over strategic considerations, increasing the risk of acquiring misaligned targets—a significant factor in acquisition failures.
Target screening: a key strategic success factor foracquisitions
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MADiscover was founded on a research-backed insight: traditional M&A screening processes systematically direct attention away from strategic fit toward what‘s immediately measurable, familiar, and available.
We built MADiscover to address these patterns. Our platform combines comprehensive data coverage with AI-powered strategic assessment, enabling teams to identify and evaluate hundreds of targets against individualized criteria while maintaining strategic focus throughout the process.