Merger and Acquisition are part of the most misunderstood words in the business world. The two business terms almost have the same meaning but there are still differences between the two words if you make a research and study the two critically. A merger simple means when two different companies come together to form a single body. This means two business entities are coming together in a form of partnership to reinforce and invigorate their strength towards extending their reach and gaining public dominance.
While Acquisition is the situation where someone or a company takes over another company. This might be as a result of many things. Another thing about merger is that the two entities coming together have equal rights unless certain conditions were struck during the merging while acquisition always gives one entity a total power over all the operational management decisions of another company. Merger usually carries a positive connotation while acquisition has more negative connotations.