The book
Mergers & Acquisitions
Strategy, Execution, and Decision-Making
M&A is not a sequence of technical steps. It is a series of decisions made under uncertainty, pressure and asymmetry. This book follows the full life of a transaction — from strategic rationale and valuation to financing, due diligence, negotiation and integration — and shows where deals are really won or lost: in judgment, not in the spreadsheet.
Germán Rovira · 17 chapters in 7 parts · English · First edition, 2026 · ISBN 979-8-2493-9650-3
“Deals do not fail or succeed on spreadsheets. They succeed — or fail — through decisions made by people.”
From the prologue
What you will take away
Six ideas that run through the book.
01
Value is not price
Value is what a business is worth. Price is what a specific buyer will pay, under specific circumstances. Confusing the two is where most negotiations go wrong.
02
EBITDA is not value
Two companies with the same EBITDA can be worth very different amounts. Cash flow — after capex and working capital — is the real currency of a deal.
03
Keep the tension alive
A sale process is designed, not improvised. Competitive tension, held until the very end, is often worth more than any valuation argument.
04
Price is not the deal
Earn-outs, deferred payments, options and warranties allocate risk. Two deals at the same price can have completely different outcomes.
05
Integration is where value lives
Value is not created at signing. It is created — or lost — every day after closing.
06
Knowing when to walk away
Sunk cost is not a reason to close. In M&A, not doing a deal is often the best deal.
From the deal room
Not a textbook. Real transactions.
Every chapter includes cases from the author’s own practice — the deals that went well, and the ones that taught more.
The ice-cream company that ran out of cash in May
A sound business, an aggressive debt structure — and a working capital peak nobody had modelled month by month.
The leisure deal at 13x that ended in Chapter 11
Why a buyer refused a capex-light company at 17x EBITDA, bought the capex-heavy one instead, and what happened next.
Three bidders, no exclusivity
How running a vendor due diligence and negotiating in parallel saved a sale when the favourite bidder lost his financing.
The last putt on the 18th hole
A negotiation on the verge of collapse after three hours — and the line about golf that closed it.
Contents
The full life of a deal, in seven parts.
Written for practitioners in corporate development, investment banking, private equity and advisory; for executives and board members involved in strategic transactions; and for graduate students preparing for a career in M&A. The reader is assumed to be comfortable with financial concepts.
Part I
Foundations of corporate finance for M&A
Strategic rationale · Corporate finance fundamentals
Part II
Valuation and deal mechanics
Business valuation · The M&A process
Part III
Capital structure and transaction financing
Private equity · MBOs and MBIs · Alternative capital · Fundraising · Leveraged transactions
Part IV
Risk identification and negotiation
Due diligence in practice · Negotiation strategy
Part V
Integration
Post-deal value realisation
Part VI
Complex and special situations
Cross-border M&A · Listed companies · ESG and corporate responsibility
Part VII
The dealmaker's perspective
The M&A professional mindset · When to act, when to wait, when to walk away
About the author
Germán Rovira Murillo
Corporate finance and M&A professional since 1994. Former partner at PwC Corporate Finance, founder of Eneas Corporate Finance and Executive Director for Spain at Houlihan Lokey – Banca Leonardo. Today Strategic, Financial and Corporate Development Director at Grupo Meridional, and Program Director of the M&A Training Program.
