what is a hostile takeover 
friendly acquisitions are most common and occur when the target firm agrees to be acquired its board of directors and shareholders approve of the acquisition and these combinations often work for the mutual benefit of the acquiring and target companies unfriendly acquisitions commonly known as hostile takeovers occur when the target company does not consent to the acquisition hostile acquisitions don t have the same agreement from the target firm and so the acquiring firm must actively purchase large stakes of the target company to gain a controlling interest which forces the acquisition the bottom linemergers and acquisitions or m a are the different ways that businesses and their assets can be bought consolidated or combined with another business an acquisition is usually the outright purchase of one company by another in a merger the two businesses generally combine to form a new company both mergers and acquisitions can be financed through a combination of stock debt or cash they may be friendly or unfriendly an unfriendly acquisition is often known as a hostile takeover and is not desired by the acquired company 