기업승계를 위한 M&A 활성화 방안 ―사모펀드(PEF: Private Equity Fund)를 중심으로―

Abstract

The succession of a corporation means the action of a corporation transferring the ownership or the management of the business to the family through bestowment or M&A while maintaining the identity of the corporation. In Korea, domestically, considering the fact that there is a high proportion of family owned companies, family conflicts related to inheritance and succession, the lack of professionality of the human resources in charge of the succession can be a basic issue, and there needs to be a precaution to such cases. The reason that corporate succession should be considered more conspicuously is because 85% of Korea's manufacturing companies are family businesses and the majority are managed by the founder or the descendants of the founding family. In view of perspective of corporate succession, the corporation can reinforce the thought of ownership and concept of a lifelong workplace through the young and competent and talented lineal descendant. Also, more active corporate innovation of the company can be enabled. The current issue and reality of Korea is the increased consideration on the succession issue of the accumulated technology and know-how due to the aging of the 1960s first generation founders of the company. The aging of the population is a phenomenon that can influence the economy and politics in the medium to long term. Therefore, under this reality, the importance of corporate succession is highly increasing for the sake of increase in employment and creation of value. Taking into account of the importance of corporate succession, the CEOs of companies are engaging in planning and executing various plans. However, the biggest problem in this process is the excessive pressure from taxation regarding the succession, and there are research results that several companies are suffering from management problems after the paying the inheritance tax. If the company fails in the successful succession of the company, and thus decrease in competency, there will be negative impacts to the national economy as well. Considering this fact, various countries including Korea have taxation policies supporting the business succession; however, only few companies can be applied to these policies since the Inheritance Tax and Gift Tax Act limits the policy to only companies under certain sizes when using the policy for corporate succession purposes. Therefore, owners of companies that are not being aided by these policies engage in M&A or splitting, merging of companies, or creation of subordinate companies, or utilize specific classes of shares from the point of view of the corporate law. Judging by the MARC M&A Attractiveness Index from 2013 reported by the Cast Business School M&A Research Centre of City University of London in December of 2013 where Korea ranked second place after the USA, it is prospected that the size of the M&A market will continuously increase in Korea. Especially, M&A through private equity funds(PEF) can be the main method for corporate succession. this paper, the author attempts to mainly discuss the current status of the corporate succession, taxation supporting policies, and M&A through PEFs, and furthermore, the implication of activation of such M&As.