From the day one of my speculation experience in stock market, I was fond of acquisition speculation.
I made my portfolio double in the very first month of my stock investment/speculation, because the company I invested, MedImmune, got acquired.
Then, within 3 months, my portfolio tripled. What I needed was confidence, thorough analysis, and common sense.
Now, I look at some of the acquisition opportunity I missed.
1. Oakley: Oakley (OO) was merged with Luxottica (LUX, it's direct competitor), Italian company, which holds Ray-Ban, Persol, and Vogue, in 2007.
I was watching Oakley jumping over 25% up in one day (I believe it was like 40% rather). Oakley was in my watch-list and was just shocked....I was stunned and tried to figure out why.
I think it was the luxury Sunglasses business of Oakley that Luxottica wanted.
The M&A Researcher of Seeking Alpha says, "Luxottica boast being a major player in the low- to mid-range product niche, where Oakley's products are mostly in the higher range in terms of cost." http://seekingalpha.com/article/40333-oakley-luxottica-group-a-merger-of-enemies
2. Wendy's: Damn, this merger really hurt me. I lost so much money on this. I was thinking it would be bought out by some other company, such as, Carl's Jr goup. The major stakeholder, the founder's family, did not want to sell the company to some others, and also when they opened the book for the show, many interested groups shunned away.
But I see much improvement in operation after the merger. I mean as a regular customer of Wendy's I can literally see they treat their customers much more nicely and the food is fresher than ever.
3. Genentech(DNA): 46.8B acquisition by Roche. I was lucky to be a shareholder of DNA and got 25% boost with this acquisition. I was mainly holding DNA because the company was very strong and was influenced less by the overall market. The market was very bad and most companies were going down. DNA was at least staying still and was making 0.5% up /day on average. Then, bam! Roche buyout DNA. I was thinking Roche would buy some company during this tough season when small companies are having tougher time because of small in cash (as I wrote in the past, cash works as a cushion during the tough period).
4. Northwest Airline. I knew there would be mergers in airline industry. There was so much talk with CAL and UAUA also. I was holding NWA and UAUA (heavier on NWA). Then I got sick of waiting and pulled out. Then, Boom!, DAL offered for an acquisition. Sigh, I wish I had more money so diversify the portfolio at that time. I just had to change my position to DNDN.
5. Samsung electronics and SanDisk: This did not happen, but why Samsung was interested in SanDisk? It's damn electronic company on SDcard. I think of it, it could be strategic buyout by Samsung for its cell phone business. Cell phone is where the growth is (MOBILE ROCKS!). And with more functionality and processes on the phone, it is more becoming like "Mobile personal computer" This is why memory and battery life becomes the key in the mobile business. And this is why app companies like "DropBox" could be funded millions of dollars by Sequoyia
(btw, this slide is really awesome, by Drew, my mentor, http://www.slideshare.net/gueste94e4c/dropbox-startup-lessons-learned-3836587
6. Cisco on Filp: I was like What? over 500 million for this small portable camera? I can't believe it! Our cell phones are having strong enough video camera capability, why the hell would I carry that one? Turned out. NO! camera is camera, cell phone is cell phone.
(Biggest reason. Again, damn battery)
But why Cisco? Why cisco which is in wireless home/business communication infrastructure business wants to acquire Flip? Oh, the company saw the growth of journalism, not only via typed words but also via video. YouTube became the second (now third) most visited site and there were more and more people demanded small, portable, lasting long, HQ video camera.
And when they upload the video, what they use? Cisco's Linksys. BAM!
Something hit my brain. Cisco is planning to make wi-fi/3G portable camcorder with Flip.
oh man, that will change the whole journalism world.
