Can people share their experiences of the strategy and m&a groups at the different companies. Microsofts is pretty awesome. Amazon. Google. Uber Fb. Can you guys share how your teams are structured ?
Sure - cool deals. Exposure across company. Incredibly flat organizations. Working on game changing pitches. It's probably the one org where you have the means to be creative.
Google is a joke in the type of deals they do - most these days are acquihire or divestiture. Amazon is going to be most close to Microsoft in terms of deal type, but they appear to be pretty junior in their maturity in process and integration . Facebook more like Google.
...and if you work in Corp Dev rather than VI, then it's all the same since deal negotiators never stick around to realize the value of a deal, tbh
lastly, Corp Dev doesn't set strategy in any company I've seen -- they execute against the strategy set by BU/PA.
At microsoft I'm part of biz Dev. I love it. But let's not downgrade what Corp Dev does. They do diligence and analysis. They're a good team.
I am also part of it. But I accomplish zilch with my analysis and due diligence. Can you tell us cases where you were able to impact the business in a positive way? That is change the course of the company with recommendation?
my point isn't to denigrate but to present reality. in Corp Dev deal negotiators don't know enough about the product, tech, marketing, sales to do real analysis of the post-close integration work needed to actually realize the value of the deal. That's in the PG/PA/BU.
back to your q on structure, Amazon has everything reporting to a VP of Corp Dev. Same w Google (the VP is a lawyer and legal has more power in Google than elsewhere). Microsoft keeps switching between this model and one where integration reports elsewhere -- and in via finance. I can't remember FB structure.
Ventures team would be awesome
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