To war-game an acquisition integration, paste the integration plan, the synergy figures in the board deck, the customer and revenue list for the acquired company, the retention and compensation plans, the systems inventory for both companies, and the Day 1, Day 30, and Day 90 milestones into one request. Then instruct Pingpong to question the plan the way a skeptical director would: which synergies have a named owner, a start date, and evidence behind them, which customers and people are most likely to leave, and which systems cannot merge when the plan says they will. Review your written answers in a second round, before the board accepts the synergy numbers as targets.
This page is for chief executives, chief operating officers, and integration leads preparing a post-close plan for board review. It covers executing the integration after the deal terms are set. For the financing terms themselves, see prepare the board's questions before you sign the term sheet. Executive starting points live under Pingpong for executives. Closing conditions and what the two companies may share before close are questions for deal counsel.
Keep a synergy ledger
Board decks usually show synergies as two totals. A ledger breaks each total into lines, and each line needs four things: an owner who will be held to it, the month it starts, the evidence it rests on, and what has to happen first. Pingpong can build the ledger from your plan and show which lines are missing a piece.
Questions by milestone
Day 1. Can every employee log in, get paid, and name their manager? Can customers of both companies reach support and get accurate invoices?
Day 30. Have the largest customers of the acquired company heard directly from a senior leader? Have the people the product depends on accepted retention terms?
Day 90. Which ledger lines have started, which have slipped, and who reports that to the board?
A worked example
This example is illustrative and does not describe a customer. A 900-person HR software company is acquiring a 150-person scheduling software company. The board deck promises $12 million in annual cost synergies and $20 million in added revenue within two years.
The chief operating officer pastes the plan, the synergy model, the acquired company's top 50 customers with renewal dates, the retention plan, both pay bands, and the systems inventory.
A useful pass starts with the ledger. The cost figure includes $5 million from closing the acquired company's office, but its lease runs four more years and does not allow subletting. The revenue figure assumes 20% of the acquirer's customers buy the scheduling product in year one, while the acquirer's sales team will not be paid on that product until the price lists merge in the third quarter.
Then the customers. The plan retires the acquired company's standalone product in 12 months. Its 20 largest customers, about 35% of its revenue, bought it standalone, and six renew during that window.
Then the people and systems. The founder's retention package vests at 12 months, but the eight engineering leads who know the codebase have no retention terms. The acquired engineers are paid about 15% above the acquirer's bands, and the plan says pay will be "harmonized" within six months, which they will read as a cut. Single sign-on and billing cannot merge for nine months, so every cross-sold deal would be invoiced by hand. The Day 90 board update is assigned to "the integration office," with no executive named.
After a second round reviews their written answers, the team revises. It restates first-year cost synergies at $7 million and phases revenue synergies to match the sales compensation change. The standalone product stays for at least two years, and a senior leader calls each of the top 20 customers in the first month. The eight engineering leads receive retention terms. Existing pay is kept, and only new hires join the acquirer's bands. The billing and sign-on milestones appear on the Day 90 list. The chief operating officer owns the Day 90 update and will present the ledger line by line.
A request you can copy
Below are our integration plan, the synergy figures in our board deck, the acquired company's customer list with renewal dates, our retention and compensation plans, both systems inventories, and our Day 1, Day 30, and Day 90 milestones. Build a synergy ledger with an owner, start month, evidence, and dependency for each line, and flag lines missing any of them. Then ask the hardest questions a director would ask about customers, people, systems, and timing. Stop there so we can answer in writing, then review our answers. Do not give legal advice. Mark closing and pre-close questions for deal counsel.
How Pingpong runs the war-game
The web review app sends your request through several models in order. Each later model receives the original request and every earlier answer, with instructions to assess the work so far. For the steps inside the app, see running your first review.
What a model can't war-game
A model does not know how the acquired team feels about the deal or what its customers were promised in sales calls. Deal counsel owns closing conditions, and the integration leaders own the plan.
When the plan goes to the board, see war-game a decision before the board meeting. More guides live under work decisions before you commit.