[bruce511]

Anecdotes are not data, and we are (most definitely) not a behemoth, but here is my experience.

A) we acquired a small (2 person) company for the people. Basically paid of their debt and they became employees. They gad experience in our domain space.

B) we acquired our distributer. We make product (hardware and software) and our (exclusive national) distributer went onto the market. We made an offer. We subsumed twice as many staff, and three times the offices.

Fast forward a decade later and the (combined) business has grown a lot, customers are better served, and there is more continuity from "farm to table".

So, from my perspective, your proposal to ban acquisitions seems to be painting with a very broad brush.

Equally, at the macro scale, there are regulatory controls in place. The recent denial of the T-mobile merger being a case in point.