BeyondVC: When competitors are acquired...: "First of all, the majority of acquisitions fail. Secondly, your competitor will be inwardly focused and quite distracted for the first 6 months trying to integrate with the parent company. Finally, depending on how the acquisition was completed, employees will begin to leave as soon as they get the bulk of their money off of the table. When a competitor is acquired, rather than sulk and worry about why it wasn't you, try to aggressively exploit the situation and use it as an opportunity to grab market share and poach some experienced and talented personnel from your nemesis. "