What Happens When Brands Change Hands?

From headline deals like Vodafone-Three or home builder, Barratt buying rival, Redrow, corporate mergers and takeovers are on the rise. Evan Davis and guests take a fresh look at what happens when companies combine. They discuss why deal-making is growing, why execs turn to M&A, what can go wrong and whether mergers deliver growth or simply disguise deeper problems. Guests: Vittorio Colao, CEO at Vodafone Group 2008-2018, and now Vice Chairman, EMEA, General Atlantic Pip Hulbert, CCO for International Markets at VML Farshid Azadegan, Director of BEC Distribution Production team: Presenter: Evan Davis Producer: Sally Abrahams Production Co-ordinator: Katie Morrison Sound engineers: Russell Newlove and Andy Garratt Editor: Matt Willis The Bottom Line is produced in partnership with The Open University

You can listen to What Happens When Brands Change Hands? online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

What Happens When Brands Change Hands? is an episode from The Bottom Line by BBC.

This episode is 33:18 long.

This episode was published on Jan 29, 2026.

Yes. Use the heart button on the episode page to add it to your favorite episodes list.

Yes. This page shows related episodes from The Bottom Line when more episodes are available from the podcast feed.