Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Manage
ment
Assignment 10:
DAVIS Growing a
company by
international
acquisition
Submitted to:
Sir Imtiaz Ahmed Mohar
Prepared by: Naima
Rizwan
Maham
Masrur
Iqra Arshad
Zahra Saleem
Sikander Azam
Class: MBA 4(F)
Date: 18/04/2013
OF THE CASE:
This case study describes and analyzes the growth of the Davis Service Group. It used to be a
conglomerate of three companies, each of which was the UK market leader; Sunlight (textile
maintenance), Elliott (building system) and HSS (tool hire). The Group needed to grow. Of the
three businesses, textile and linen hire provided the most opportunities because of the strategic fit
factor. The other business were sold off to concentrate on textile business in Europe and to
provide funds to invest further in this business.
FACTS
OF THE CASE :
MAIN ISSUES:
They operated only in UK which had become mature market due to which fewer
When they expand their business overseas they may face many issues like:
o Language differences can lead to confusion
o Currency differences
o Cultural differences
o Legal and administrative differences may vary across countries
1 | Page
OPTIONS
Organic growth i.e. increasing turnover of the existing business. Much of the growth of
Sunlight and Berendsen involves organic growth. This can also be described as increasing
sales and new customers for the existing business to improve profitability.
Inorganic growth is through the acquisition of another business. A business can grow by
joining one or more companies together. This can be by mergers or takeovers.
RECOMMENDED
ALTERNATIVE :
Davis Services Group expanded and grew through the horizontal integration in 2002 and it took
over Berendsen Company, which was the leader of the market of Europe in the same nature of
business. The acquisition of the company was helpful as it was not much difficult for the Davis
group to take over the Berendsen. Therefore inorganic growth was the best alternative to all the
issues addressed.
2 | Page
QUESTION 1: DESCRIBE
CAN GROW.
GIVE
GROWING.
Inorganic growth
Organic growth
Inorganic Growth:
Inorganic growth is when a business grows by joining two or more companies together through
mergers, takeovers, etc. Microsoft is a clear case of inorganic growth because they have
successfully completed more than 100 mergers since 1986.
Organic Growth:
Organic growth is when a company grows by increasing the turnover of the existing businesses.
Apple Inc. is probably an excellent example of Organic Growth. Apples growth is driven by
trend-setting product innovation like Macintosh, iMac, iPod etc. which resulted in their increased
annual turnover and market share.
QUESTION 2: BUSINESSES
ACQUISITION
OF
BERENDSEN
PROVIDED
EXPLAIN
SUCH
HOW
GOOD
Acquiring Berendsen was a good growth opportunity for the Davis Service Group because they
were market leader in the textile maintenance sector and they had the annual turnover of 820
million pounds so definitely they had the financial resources to expand and also they had the
proven management system in providing textile services. Berendsen on the other hand was also
the market leader in the other geographic area in providing the textile services and by building on
Berendsens local experience and local market contacts Davis Service Group could buy into
established networks and customer relationships. The barriers that usually companies face in the
3 | Page
international growth like language, cultural difference and currency exchange were easy to
overcome in this acquisition.
QUESTION 3: WHAT
ASPECTS OF
EUROPEAN UNION
MARKETS HAVE
PARTICULARLY ENCOURAGED:
QUESTION 4: IF
WHAT
If the company has to expand somewhere in the near future, to me it will be expanding the china
market because the market in china is having a lot of scope even more than the European Union
market.
4 | Page
The important factors which are necessary and encouraged the expansion of any company
weather it is the type of integrations (vertical or horizontal), besides the thinking of merging and
taking over are:
The factor which can be effective in making the expansion useful in the China market
which I think is most suitable worldwide for the expansion of the business is the business
companies also will be quite very much cheaper than the rest of the world.
Language difference can lead to confusion but English is the main global business
language spoken by many people in China as well which helps in communication across
different regions.
Skill level may vary between countries but china labor is highly skilled and there is an
availability of cheap labor which is the important encouraging factor to expand there.
Globally managing the staff is quite a big problem as the distance of china and Britain is
very far.
The timing difference according is the biggest problem in the assessment of efficiency of
5 | Page
TERMINOLOGIES
Markets:the range of means bywhich consumers can buy aparticular product.
Competitive advantage:astrategic element that enables an organization to compete
moreeffectively than its rivals.
Conglomerate:a group of businesses joined in a single entity.Each of the businesses focuses on
a different product or service area.
Mature market: a market in which the prospects of future growth are diminishing.
Revenues:the total value of sales.
Return on investment: the return on the funds invested in the business.
Shareholders:persons owning or holding a share or shares of stock.
Strategy:long-term business plan of an organization.
European Union:27 countries joined together by a Treaty allowing the free movement of goods,
people and services in single area and involving political and economic co-operation.
Costs:the price of carrying out anactivity (can be in money, time or people).
Imported: goods or servicespurchased from other country.
Exported:goods or services soldabroad.
Organic growth: increasing sales and new customers for the existing business to improve
profitability.
Inorganic growth:growth that expands the business from outside.
Merger:two businesses join through mutual agreement.
Takeover:one business acquires at least 51% of the shares in another company.
Horizontal integration:joining another business at the same stage of production.
6 | Page
Economies of scale: reductions in average costs that stem from operating on a large scale
Vertical integration:where acompany buys another companythat supplies it with goods or
thatbuys goods from it in order tocontrol all the processes ofproduction.
Supply chain: the chain ofprocesses linking the manufactureof products with physical
distributionto move goods quickly andefficiently to meet consumer needs.
Profitability:money which isearned in trade or business, after paying the costs of producing
andselling goods and services.
Operating costs: the overall cost of running the business.
Fixed costs:costs that remainunchanged over time e.g. interestcharges on loans, permanent
staffsalary, pension rights of retiredemployees, insurance premiums.
Strategic fit:matching theresources of a business to thechanging business environment.
Best practice:the development of performance standards based upon the most efficient practices
within an organization.
Decentralized: authority delegated by dividing the organization into several units, each
responsible for its own performance/decisions.
7 | Page