My company just got acquired I am worried about my job?

Question

My company just got acquired by a much bigger company. It is not a hostile takeover. My question is: Can an acquiring company come in and legally fire people if it wants to? Since the acquiring company bought all the assets of the company and it is not a hostile takeover, doesn't that mean they bought the employees too? Please advise!

Answer 1

Management can pretty much do what ever they want. How they do it mostly depends on the type of take over. In many cases they eliminate whole departments which gives them the reason for laying off or firing workers - no longer a need for them. They can always open a new department with a different title but provides the same functions, just with new people. Not being a hostile take over, that may not be the case. Do you have reason to believe everyone is being let go? You may want to be getting your resume out there.

Companies do not "buy" employees. They either maintain or replace the human resources available to them. They are either disposable (especially if they are higher paid) or valuable to the company because of their skills. As in most of life, it all depends.

Good luck.

Answer 2

Yes they can eliminate departments to eliminate duplicate departments. Either that or they can merge departments laying off personal from company they acquired they do not need once the departments are fully merged.
About the only way you are semi-safe is if your company is union and you are a hourly employee in the bargaining unit. Note I said semi-safe because, even then you are not completely safe.
The acquiring company can close the plant or close the company and reopen it as a subsidiary under a different name to get rid of the unions. That has been done a lot and it is legal. They just have to keep your company or plant shut down long enough to satisfy the legal requirements.

Answer 3

You are right to be concerned, typically when a larger company buys a smaller company it is because the smaller company has an asset that the larger company wants. The typical scenario is that the larger company takes over, integrates the acquired technology badly into their business and fires most of the better employees in the smaller company. I wish you luck, I fear that you are going to need it.

Answer 4

Yes..they own your company and can eliminate positions that they deem to be superfluos...job eliminations are more common when the acquiring entity and the acquired entity are in the same, similar or complementary businesses. It is sometimes required to keep the entire existing managament and personnel in place if the acquired business is different.

I am sure the new management will make an announcement soon. All the best.

Answer 5

In lots of instances, a new broom sweeps clean.