A general term used to refer to the consolidation of companies. A merger is a combination of two companies to form a new company, while an acquisition is the purchase of one company by another in which no new company is formed.
Taobiz explains Mergers And Acquisitions - M&A
An example of a major merger is the merging of JDS Fitel Inc. and Uniphase Corp. in 1999 to form JDS Uniphase. An example of a major acquisition is Manulife Financial Corporation's 2004 acquisition of John Hancock Financial Services Inc.
The term M&A also refers to the department at financial institutions that deals with mergers and acquisitions.
