Architecting Growth in the Digital Era

This book provides the reader with the cognitive keys and practical guidelines to manage acquisitive growth in the digital era. It takes a distinct managerial perspective on acquisitions, with a relentless focus on how Enterprise Architecture (EA) relates to value creation. The book builds upon an extensive fundament of rigorous research, first-hand experiences from using Enterprise Architecture to catalyze acquisitions in several Fortune 500 companies, and a wide pool of case examples from leading firms in the US, Europe and Australia. The book is divided into three parts. Part I addresses the fundament for the book by decomposing the problem of acquisitive growth and explaining how advance in EA practices have created the potential for mitigating the challenges. Part II then details how an advanced EA capability can contribute to the different phases of an acquisition process. Lastly, Part III provides hands-on guidance on how to implement EA in the acquisition process and concludes with a summary and personal advice from the authors as notes on the journey ahead. Overall, this book explains how Enterprise Architecture can be used to unlock the value potential in acquisitions without bringing the need for a major organizational restructure. It provides managers, EA professionals, and MBA students with the cognitive keys to characterize the problems and to craft and implement effective solutions.