After close, you’re paying for two of everything: systems, vendors, licences and IT support. We bring the acquired company onto your platform, retire what’s duplicated, take cost out of operations and track every saving to an owner and a date, so the synergies in your deal model actually show up on the P&L. Nothing breaks on Day 1 along the way.
From signing through Day 100 and beyond
Integration roadmap, Day 1 plan and synergy tracker
An integration management office led by Compello
PE platforms buying add-ons, and strategic acquirers
Diligence
Day 1
TSA exit
Integration
M&A IT integration brings an acquired company onto the buyer’s technology: email and identity, ERP and finance, payroll, networks, security and IT support. Done well, the business keeps running through close, the two companies work as one, and the savings in the deal model show up on the P&L.
It starts before the deal closes. Day 1 needs are set while there’s still time to plan, then an integration management office (IMO) runs the work through the first 100 days and beyond, so every team works to one plan and one set of deadlines.
What has to work on the day the deal closes?
Which systems merge, and which stay separate?
Whose ERP, email and identity will the combined company use?
Is the acquired company safe to connect to your network?
Where are the savings, and when will they land?
Who makes the decisions, and who runs IT afterwards?
Every system and operation both companies depend on, brought onto one standard in the right order, with security checked before anything connects.
Day 1 checklists by function
Email, identity and MFA for every user
ERP posting, payroll and vendor payments working
Command center and support at close
Customer and employee communications
What has to work at close?
Who signs off that we’re ready?
ERP and core applications consolidated
HR, payroll and HR systems
Email and tenant migration, including Teams and files
CRM and customer data
Data migration and reporting
AI tools and AI policy brought onto the platform’s standard
Which platform do we keep?
What happens to the data?
Networks, sites and field devices
Cloud and infrastructure rationalized
Phones and collaboration tools
Security baseline before connecting
MSP, help desk, NOC and SOC consolidated
Is it safe to connect?
Who supports users during the move?
Synergy targets with owners
Vendor and licence consolidation
Duplicate applications retired
IT budget and spend brought together
Integration costs tracked, one-time and run-rate
Where are the savings?
Are they showing up on the P&L?
Process redesign and Lean efficiency
Procurement and supplier consolidation
Shared services: finance, HR and customer service
Facility, warehouse and footprint consolidation
Inventory and working capital
Where is the operational upside?
Is cost coming out of the combined business?
Security comes first: the acquired company is assessed and brought up to your security baseline before its systems join your network.
Each phase has a goal and something you can hold us to. One integration management office runs underneath all of them, so decisions get made and no team waits on another.
Set the end state, the Day 1 needs and the plan to get there.
Integration office set up, with a weekly cadence
End-state operating and technology model
Day 1 checklists by function
Synergy targets and integration costs confirmed
Integration roadmap and Day 1 plan
Customers, employees and suppliers notice the announcement, not the systems.
Command center open at close
Email, identity and MFA for every user
ERP posting, payroll and vendor payments working
Customer and employee communications sent
Day 1 readiness, certified before close
The moves that make two companies work as one, fast.
Email and tenant migration, including Teams and files
Payroll and shared services integrated
Data moved into the core ERP and CRM
Security and disaster recovery standardized
AI policy adopted, with an AI maturity assessment
One email system and one organization
The larger consolidations, in planned releases, with the savings tracked.
ERP and core applications consolidated
Duplicate applications and infrastructure retired
MSP, help desk, NOC and SOC consolidated
IT budget and spend brought together
Operational efficiency: process, sourcing, footprint and inventory
One platform, with savings tracked to the P&L
Integration management office (IMO)
Decisions, risks, milestones and weekly reporting
Change management and communications
Town halls, training and customer messaging
Synergy and benefits tracking
Each saving tied to a milestone and an owner
Day 1 is certified before close. Anything that isn’t essential on Day 1 moves into the 100-day plan, so nothing is improvised on the day.
Two PE-backed industrial wire companies ran as one business on two separate IT stacks, paying twice to run one company. Here’s how we brought them together.
$200K
a year saved on infrastructure maintenance
No security monitoring
No business continuity plan
Wi-Fi dead spots in the warehouses
One network and one domain
New firewalls, switches and access points
ERP and servers on Microsoft Azure
Microsoft 365 email under one domain
Monitoring, endpoint protection and managed devices
One business continuity plan for both
Two companies running as one business on separate networks, domains and phone systems, with the ERP on aging servers and no security monitoring.
With fractional CIO leadership, we merged the networks and domains, replaced the legacy hardware, moved the ERP and servers to Azure and put everyone on Microsoft 365.
$200K a year saved on maintenance, a faster monthly close, no more ERP server downtime and one continuity plan for both companies.
Most integration drag comes from doing the right things in the wrong order. These are the four patterns we see most. How we sequence around them is something we walk through in a scoping call.
Systems are merged before anyone agrees how the combined company will work.
The org chart is redrawn before the platform decisions are made.
Vendor contracts are cut one at a time, as they come up.
Synergies are tracked only in the finance model.
A structured path from the operating model to stable combined operations, led by the senior operators who scope the work.
How far and how fast to integrate, the end state, and the synergy targets.
Function plans and platform decisions, with Day 1 and Day 100 needs mapped.
Integration office and decision rights set up, and Day 1 certified, before close.
Systems and operations consolidated in planned releases, with EBITDA impact measured.
Three integrations where the systems came together and the savings followed, and what a client said afterwards.
We unified 43 systems into one operating platform for a PE-backed automotive aftermarket rollup, cutting $1.6M in annual costs.
Read the case study →
A $500M division carved out of an $8B public company, with eight facilities on different ERPs and the CIO gone a week before close. We centralized the ERP within three months and stabilized IT.
Read the case study →
Two acquired industrial wire companies moved onto one network, one domain and one Azure footprint, with the ERP migrated and one business continuity plan for both.
Read the case study →A strategic, roll-up-their-sleeves attitude that drives bottom-line IT and operational savings. Compello identified our gaps, recommended practical solutions, and ensured all parties executed.
VP Global Supply Chain, $150M food manufacturerSomething we haven’t covered? A partner can answer it on a short call.
M&A IT integration, also called IT integration for M&A, is the work of bringing an acquired company onto the buyer’s technology after a deal: email and identity, ERP and finance, payroll and HR systems, networks, security and IT support. It covers what has to work on Day 1, the order in which systems are brought together, and tracking the savings the deal was built on.
It’s one part of our M&A IT services, and usually follows an IT due diligence that sizes the integration cost before you sign.
Before close. The weeks between signing and close are when Day 1 needs are set, the integration management office is set up and the 100-day plan is written. Starting after close means Day 1 is improvised and the first weeks are spent catching up.
The best starting point is diligence. What it finds on the target’s systems, contracts and security feeds straight into the integration cost estimate and the plan.
Day 1 readiness is planned between signing and close. In the first 100 days, the core pieces come together: email and identity, payroll and shared services, data in the core systems and one security program.
Larger moves, such as consolidating onto one ERP, usually follow in planned releases after Day 100, at a pace set by the platforms and by how far the businesses will integrate. In one post-merger IT integration program for an acquisitive platform, we replaced the ERP, e-commerce, CRM and warehouse systems at eight acquisitions in 18 months.
Everything the business needs to keep serving customers and paying people: email, identity and secure access for every user, the ERP posting transactions and paying vendors, payroll on the right entity, banking and approvals, help desk support, and communications to customers and employees.
We build Day 1 checklists by function, then certify readiness with a cross-functional sign-off before close. Anything that isn’t essential on Day 1 moves into the 100-day plan.
No. Part of the plan is deciding how far and how fast to integrate: full consolidation, or keeping some functions standalone where that serves the investment thesis. We set that end state first, so every system decision points the same way.
Where consolidation makes sense, it’s sequenced: processes are agreed before systems move, and vendor exits are timed to contract dates.
The IMO is the team that runs the integration: one plan, one weekly cadence, clear decision rights, and one view of milestones, risks and synergies across every workstream. We set it up and run it, coordinating finance, HR, operations, IT and your deal team.
That makes our merger and acquisition integration services more than an IT project. IT is the workstream we run hands-on, and the IMO keeps the rest moving with it. The same approach runs a separation on our IT carve-out consulting engagements.
Yes. Alongside the systems, we capture the operational synergies the deal model depends on: process redesign and Lean efficiency, procurement and shared services consolidation, facility and warehouse moves, and inventory and working capital. See our private equity operations consulting.
Your own team, or us. We can stay on as the combined company’s managed IT provider, run its security through our private equity cybersecurity services, or support the ERP through our private equity ERP services.
On buy-and-build platforms, we also leave a repeatable playbook behind, so each new add-on follows the same path onto the platform.
What the target’s IT will really cost to run, fix, separate or integrate, before you sign.
Security posture, compliance gaps and cyber-insurance exposure, priced before you sign.
Whether the ERP can carry the investment thesis, before signing or after close.
Separation design, TSA scope and governance, Day 1 cutover and an early exit from the TSA.
One office running every workstream for carve-outs, ERP integrations and other transactions.
AI readiness, maturity, governance and training, tied to EBITDA.
Share the deal timeline and what you know about the target’s systems. We’ll show you what Day 1 needs, what the integration will cost and where the savings are.
