[gvb]

June 7th AND 8th: Weiner and Hoffman each chat (separately) with Nadella, telling him the $182 offer just isn’t good enough, but that they are open to a $200 per share offer in cash. Sure, Nadella says, but we need to find “cost synergies” with that price.

"Cost synergies" is a euphemism for layoffs. In other words, Linkedin's employees will be paying for the bid increase.

[bostonpete]

I thought "cost synergies" involved getting rid of redundancies -- e.g. we don't need to maintain two separate accounting organizations and can save a bunch of money by combining them.

Yes, that could involve layoffs, but what's the alternative? Do you think Microsoft (or any buyer) is going to keep around unnecessary personnel after an acquisition if they manage to get a lower price? I would assume they'd end up saving money on the acquisition and cutting personnel. Why would they do otherwise...?