{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,13]],"date-time":"2026-05-13T23:35:43Z","timestamp":1778715343001,"version":"3.51.4"},"reference-count":40,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"7","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2017,7,21]],"date-time":"2017-07-21T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1500595200000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001809","name":"National Natural Science Foundation of China","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["No. U1435212, 61272095, 61303107, 61432011, 61573231 and 61672331"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["No. U1435212, 61272095, 61303107, 61432011, 61573231 and 61672331"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001809","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"name":"Shanxi Science and Technology Infrastructure","award":["No. 2015091001-0102"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["No. 2015091001-0102"]}]},{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100004480","name":"Natural Science Foundation of Shanxi Province","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["No. 201601D021076, 201601D021072 and 2015021101"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["No. 201601D021076, 201601D021072 and 2015021101"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100004480","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Symmetry"],"abstract":"<jats:p>As a significant business activity, merger and acquisition (M&amp;A) generally means transactions in which the ownership of companies, other business organizations or their operating units are transferred or combined. In a typical M&amp;A procedure, M&amp;A target selection is an important issue that tends to exert an increasingly significant impact on different business areas. Although some research works based on fuzzy methods have been explored on this issue, they can only deal with incomplete and uncertain information, but not inconsistent and indeterminate information that exists universally in the decision making process. Additionally, it is advantageous to solve M&amp;A problems under the group decision making context. In order to handle these difficulties in M&amp;A target selection background, we introduce a novel rough set model by combining interval neutrosophic sets (INSs) with multigranulation rough sets over two universes, called an interval neutrosophic (IN) multigranulation rough set over two universes. Then, we discuss the definition and some fundamental properties of the proposed model. Finally, we establish decision making rules and computing approaches for the proposed model in M&amp;A target selection background, and the effectiveness of the decision making approach is demonstrated by an illustrative case analysis.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/sym9070126","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2017,7,21]],"date-time":"2017-07-21T10:45:48Z","timestamp":1500633948000},"page":"126","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":17,"title":["Merger and Acquisition Target Selection Based on Interval Neutrosophic Multigranulation Rough Sets over Two Universes"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"9","author":[{"given":"Chao","family":"Zhang","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Key Laboratory of Computational Intelligence and Chinese Information Processing of Ministry of Education, School of Computer and Information Technology, Research Institute of Big Data Science and Industry, Shanxi University, Taiyuan 030006, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-2489-9404","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Deyu","family":"Li","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Key Laboratory of Computational Intelligence and Chinese Information Processing of Ministry of Education, School of Computer and Information Technology, Research Institute of Big Data Science and Industry, Shanxi University, Taiyuan 030006, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-0229-2460","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Arun","family":"Sangaiah","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Computing Science and Engineering, VIT University, Vellore 632014, India"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Said","family":"Broumi","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Laboratory of Information Processing, Faculty of Science Ben M\u2019Sik, University Hassan II, B.P 7955, Sidi Othman, Casablanca, Morocco"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2017,7,21]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"110","DOI":"10.1016\/j.frl.2016.02.005","article-title":"Global merger and acquisition (M&A) activity: 1992\u20132011","volume":"17","author":"Yilmaz","year":"2016","journal-title":"Financ. 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