Aquisis

Strategic adaptations in response to economic cycles: Navigating industry life stages for competitive advantage

RESEARCH PULSE
Businesses continually adapt their strategies in response to economic cycles, tailoring their approaches to align with the maturity stages of their industries. Economic fluctuations impact firms differently depending on whether they are in the introduction, growth, maturity, or decline stage. In this article we explore how economic conditions influence strategic decisions, from investment in innovation to operational efficiency and market expansion and introduce the Boom and Bloom matrix as a visual tool to guide strategy thinking.

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Strategic adaptation: How firms pivot to navigate market shifts and emerging opportunities

Market shifts are inevitable, driven by economic changes, technology, consumer trends, and geopolitical disruptions. Firms that successfully pivot leverage agility, innovation, and strategic foresight to stay competitive. The dynamic capabilities framework highlights how companies like Amazon, Tesla, and Zara have adapted by reconfiguring resources and investing in digital transformation. Rising defense budgets and the digitalization of security present new opportunities, particularly for struggling industries like the European automotive supply chain. By repurposing their existing deep expertise, these firms can pivot into adjacent defense applications. Effective market pivots require organizational flexibility, innovation, and supportive policies to foster long-term resilience and growth.

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The role of workplace diversity in innovation and leadership performance

RESEARCH PULSE

Workplace diversity has been recognized as a driver of innovation, enhanced creativity, and improved decision-making. Diverse teams provide various perspectives, boosting problem-solving and adaptability. However, its impact depends on company culture and management strategies. While diversity offers significant benefits, such as reducing cognitive biases and enhancing resource networks, it can also present challenges like communication barriers. Effective management of diversity is crucial to leverage its full potential. In the same vein, cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&As) can further drive innovation by blending diverse cultural and governance practices, creating a competitive advantage.

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Mutual value creation and synergy between Private Equity funds and portfolio companies

RESEARCH PULSE

Private equity has evolved significantly, growing from a niche sector in 1989 to accounting for 2–5% of GDP in recent years. PE firms create value through productivity gains, managerial improvements, and market expansion, driving sales growth and innovation. They target both turnaround and high-profit firms, leveraging capital and expertise. Despite significant challenges like stagnant exits, volatile IPO markets, and higher interest rates, the sector adapts by emphasizing longer-term strategies. These include operational turnarounds, corporate carve-outs, and collaborations with experts.

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The rise of activist investing: Trends, strategies, and outcomes

RESEARCH PULSE

Activist investing plays a pivotal role in corporate transformation, as investors seek to optimize company performance and maximize shareholder value. Over the past two decades, activist hedge funds have expanded significantly, exerting substantial influence over corporate governance and strategic decision-making. These investors typically target undervalued firms with high institutional ownership and governance deficiencies, often resulting in board restructuring and CEO turnover. In 2022–2023 alone, 1,139 activist campaigns were initiated globally. The evolving leadership landscape, particularly in technology, highlights the growing impact of activist investors, whose influence on corporate strategy, governance, and shareholder returns remains profound.

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Outlook 2025: Our year-end chart book

RESEARCH PULSE

Looking ahead to 2025, we approach the future with cautious optimism. While mixed signals persist and the unpredictable dynamics of geopolitics and American politics present undeniable risks, the overall trajectory appears to be one of normalization. This normalization encompasses structural and long-term trends, which will pose challenges for some industries while offering support to others.

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About

Aquisis offers independent strategy advice built on bespoke analyses

Aquisis' approach is based on an investor mindset and a priority on generating value for owners

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For investors

Aquisis was built out of years of experience in private equity consulting. Supporting investor decision making with structured advice, marrying the investor mindset with consultants' eyes, is what Aquisis is all about
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For Corporations

Aquisis' services for publicly traded corporations lever our expertise at the intersection of investor mindset a strategy consultants' eyes. Focus is hence on the one hand to enable corporate managers to see their own company through the eyes of an investor. On the other hand, Aquisis can help corporates act with the rigor of an investor when looking to acquire targets.
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For SMEs

Aquisis supports ambitious SMEs who want to take a strategic look at their business to generate value. In addition, we help startups and scale-up to professionalize and prepare for fundraising
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Insight Nuggets

Some of our recent bite-sized insight nuggets. See all Insights by theme here

The luxury industry: A strategic reset for 2025 and beyond

As the luxury industry experiences a slowdown, brands may need to strike a balance between exclusivity and price increases, as customers begin to question the value of mainstream products priced at significantly higher levels. With price hikes nearing their limit, brands will be compelled to explore alternative avenues for sustainable growth.

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Recovering sectors and fundamentals: A year of opportunity

Our analysis of projected revenue growth for 2024–2025 highlights promising trends across most sectors in Europe and North America. In contrast, emerging markets, including Latin America, continue to face significant headwinds and structural inefficiencies.

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How private equity turned Europe’s challenges into a $133bn opportunity as valuations hit record discounts

In Europe, “it is now possible to identify market-leading yet relatively under-the-radar companies with valuations exceeding $1 billion, often at a discount compared to their US peer” notes Alexis Maskell from BC Partners in a recent interview on January 12th with the Financial Times

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Investor activism in Europe: A rising threat for small and midcap companies calling for strategic changes and leadership overhauls

Aquisis conducted a comprehensive analysis of over 600 nonfinancial small and midcap companies across Europe. The evaluation, which assessed firms across four key dimensions, revealed that 15% of these companies exhibit an elevated risk of becoming targets for activist investors.

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Strategy diagnostic

If you don't mind regularly spending a few hundred dollars to protect the value of your car (~ 0.5% of value), you surely understand that a regular check-up on your company's strategy makes sense - and will come a lot cheaper relative to the value.

Private markets investors create value by seeing value and -more importantly- untapped value creation potential, and then utilizing high-powered incentives to realize them. Aquisis takes a cue from this playbook to help private companies generate sustainable value for generations. For an insider, key value levers may be invisible and big changes may go unnoticed when they come creeping up. The strategy diagnostic addresses this issue.

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Value

The central tenet of Aquisis is value: We help entrepreneurs create value, investors identify value levers, retiring founders realise value they created, and owner families preserve and grow value for the next generation. Value is not an expression of short-term accounting metrics or exposure to trends, but a fundamental and forward-looking metric.

We believe that bespoke analyses of quality data are paramount for sound decisions, but we also know that value creation always requires this to be augmented with a people-centric approach of communication and listening. Value as a principle also means that we are uncompromising in our commitment to the highest ethical standards.

Partners & Memberships

Aquisis partners with select other professional services firms that adhere to Aquisis' high standards as well as leading industry associations:
AM&AA, the Alliance of Merger & Acquisition Advisors is the leading association of advisors for mid-market M&A in the United States.
epp is an independent investigations bureau and advisory, focusing on the digital realm. epp and aquisis partner in the field of supporting corporates and long-term investors understand vulnerabilities and identify activist investor threats.
metaBeratung is a management consultancy operating in DACH. Personality matters at metaBeratung: through Hogan personality assessments the team consults medium-sized and DAX companies in making the right hiring decisions and identify future potentials for development.
S&P Global is the leading global provider of company and market data in addition to a deep trove of industry-specific data.

Strategic adaptations in response to economic cycles: Navigating industry life stages for competitive advantage

Strategic adaptation: How firms pivot to navigate market shifts and emerging opportunities

The role of workplace diversity in innovation and leadership performance

Mutual value creation and synergy between Private Equity funds and portfolio companies