Food for thought. “Synergies” == “eliminating departments”
Absolutely - the vast majority of synergies are cost cuts which means either associates at your firm or associates at some other firm that you pay to provide a service or product. There are revenue synergies in some cases, but those are usually small and less relied on during M&A negotiations. My company is being acquired currently and I was on the deal team on our side, plus took several M&A classes during B school 10 years ago. Fortunately, we aren’t being acquired and merged with another firm and the mgmt team is staying, but any costs related to being a public company will be cut - roughly $5-6 million a year in costs - 1/3 of which are our associates and the rest are external costs that will be cut (eg: auditors) at other firms.