By the third quarter of 2025, the global construction mergers and acquisitions (M&A) deal value reached $33 billion, a 49% year-over-year. Favorable financing conditions, federal infrastructure spending, and private equity’s increase interest in construction services, particularly in specialty and service-oriented segments.
While there is exciting growth outlook, expanded capabilities and market consolidations to look forward to, there is more than meets the eye to make two separate companies operate smoothly as a single entity. We are talking about coordinated actions across human resources, IT systems, supply chain, client service, and finance especially. This entails aligning two distinct sets of financial data, systems, and policies.
Here are some pain points you may come across when poor financial integration happens and discover how Sage Intacct can mitigate them for you.
Pain Point #1 - Systems and Data Integration
Pain point #1Systems and Data Integration:
Before Sage Intacct, the parent company's finance team might consolidate results
through Excel workbooks. The U.S. controller exports trial balances, the Canadian
controller sends CAD financials, the U.K. controller sends GBP financials, and
corporate manually translates currencies, eliminates intercompany balances, and
prepares a board reporting package. This creates a high-risk close process: formula
errors, late submissions, inconsistent FX rates, and unclear ownership of
intercompany mismatches.
Sage Intacct SolutionRapid Consolidation:
With Sage Intacct, the buyer can model entities under a parent structure, support
multicurrency reporting, and manage inter-entity transactions and eliminations
inside the system. Sage states that Intacct can help companies add entities to
match their reporting structure, define ownership structures, generate reporting
books, and reduce time spent managing inter-entity transactions and eliminations.
Pain Point #1 - Systems and Data Integration
Pain point #2Cultural Clashes:
A common cultural clash occurs when corporate finance tells the acquired company,
"You must do everything our way immediately." The target company's finance team
may resist because they are already managing customer billing, payroll, vendor
payments, and local reporting.
Sage Intacct SolutionScalability for Portfolio Growth:
A scalable Intacct rollout gives corporate a more standardized structure while
still allowing the acquired company to preserve some operating detail through
dimensions.
For example, the parent company may require a standard chart of accounts,
close calendar, and approval matrix, while allowing each acquired business to
retain local reporting views by location, project, or service line. That
reduces friction because integration becomes structured rather than arbitrary.
Pain Point #1 - Systems and Data Integration
Pain point #3Closing & Post-Close Reporting:
A newly acquired company closes its books on the 18th business day of the
month. The acquiring company closes on the 7th business day because lenders
and investors require timely reporting. The target's finance team relies on
manual journal entries, email approvals, Excel reconciliations, and
undocumented review steps.
Nobody intentionally built a bad process; the business simply outgrew the
tools it was using. After close, corporate finance pushes for a faster
reporting cycle. This creates tension. The acquired team says, "We cannot
close that quickly." Corporate says, "We need your numbers for board
reporting."
Sage Intacct SolutionImproved Efficiency:
This is where close automation and workflow standardization matter. Close
Automation in Sage Intacct is designed to provide real-time visibility,
automate workflows, and support accuracy during month-end close.
Instead of managing the close through scattered emails and spreadsheets, the
finance team can create a close checklist with assigned owners, due dates,
review steps, and supporting documentation. Recurring journal entries,
approvals, reconciliations, and variance reviews become more visible and
repeatable.
Pain Point #1 - Systems and Data Integration
Pain point #4Valuation and Synergy Realization:
A sponsor acquires a platform company and three add-ons. The deal thesis
assumes margin improvement from vendor consolidation, shared back-office
functions, and cross-selling. Six months after close, the board asks, "Are we
actually realizing the synergies we underwrote?"
Without dimensional reporting, finance may struggle to answer. The chart of
accounts may show payroll, software, rent, revenue, and COGS, but not enough
detail to isolate performance by acquired entity, product line, customer
segment, location, or synergy initiative. The CFO may know total EBITDA, but
not whether the acquisition thesis is working.
Sage Intacct Dimensions are designed to classify and report on company
information in meaningful ways. Dimensions are like tags that can be applied
to transactions and entries, with every transaction able to carry multiple
dimension values. It's a way to organize, sort, and report on businesses with
multiple services, products, or locations without relying on thousands of
account combinations.
Hence, accurate accounting is essential in mitigating risks, ensuring compliance, and facilitating a seamless transition. With Sage Intacct’s multi-entity consolidation, newly acquired company's financials can be folded into the platform without rebuilding from scratch, cutting the integration timeline significantly. By choosing the right tool, your company’s operational day one post-merger would be a stroll in the park.
Sage can (probably)* do that.
Give us a chance to show you how Sage can transform your business.
*Our lawyer insisted on a disclaimer here. Sage can’t do literally everything. But it comes close.
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