Deel's M&A strategy prioritizes bringing in teams with years of deep, obsessive experience in a specific product area. This allows them to instantly add product depth that would take years to build internally, viewing it as more valuable than just acquiring revenue or general talent.

When his team proposed building a feature in 9 months, Nikesh Arora rejected it. He argued that the competing startup wouldn't just wait; they'd also be 9 months further ahead. This "moving target" dynamic makes acquiring a fast-moving team a way to buy a permanent time advantage.

Chandra Dev Mehta explains how Hexion uses M&A to pivot from a traditional chemical company into a 'technology focused chemicals as a service' business. This strategic use of acquisitions helps them escape the challenges of the commodity sector by adding a recurring service and technology layer to their offerings.

When tasked with creating a new product line from zero, a CPO's first move can be to acquire a small company already operating in the space. This "buy before build" strategy can dramatically accelerate progress by inheriting a team that has already solved many of the foundational problems, bypassing a lengthy hiring and development cycle.

Established software leaders should not try to innovate on all new AI technologies organically. A more effective strategy is to let the VC community fund early-stage bets, then use strong balance sheets to acquire the proven winners and integrate them into existing platforms, as Salesforce has done.

Instead of a traditional sales push for a newly acquired service, Hexion partners with customers to co-develop the offering. This approach gives customers 'skin in the game,' ensures the product meets their needs, and accelerates adoption in a market unfamiliar with the new 'chemicals as a service' model.

In a fast-moving field like cybersecurity, it's impossible to build everything in-house. By treating M&A as an extension of the R&D department, a large company can leverage the venture-backed ecosystem to acquire innovative teams and products that are already validated.

Instead of jumping directly to an acquisition, de-risk the process by first establishing a partnership or licensing agreement. This allows you to test the technology, cultural fit, and market reception with a lower commitment, building a stronger foundation for a potential future deal.

Deel's acquisition strategy accelerates time-to-market by rebuilding an acquired product's front-end within two months and immediately giving it to the sales team. While salespeople are learning and selling, the engineering team rebuilds the entire back-end natively. This parallel process closes a potential 12-month integration gap and generates immediate market feedback.