1.7.
Covering mentioned research gap, there were stated research goal and research statement. Research goal: to investigate what is the effect of M&A deals on companies' financial performance in Russian digital ecosystems.  Precisely, financial performance is understood here as a performance on financial market. Such choice is described and justified in methodology part. The term “financial performance” hereinafter refers to the performance of stocks – abnormal returns. Definitely, there are also some other indicators of financial performance, but this research is limited to performance of stocks.  Research question is corresponding to the research goal and can be stated as: what is the effect of M&A deals on companies' financial performance in Russian digital ecosystems?  With an aim to answer this question, there were stated such research hypothesizes: M&A deals have an effect on long-term financial performance of the acquirers (ecosystem creators). Since results in prior studies are ambiguous, there must be stated such hypothesize and analyzed via t-test with the null hypothesize that abnormal returns are equal to 0. If they are not, then there is certain effect. Then, it must be studied more, which was done in linear regression analysis. M&A deals have an effect on short-term financial performance of the acquirers (ecosystem creators). Similarly to first hypothesize, there must be tested short-term performance. M&A deals have an effect on financial performance of the acquirers’ rivals. Similar to previous hypothesizes, there must be analyzed abnormal returns of acquirer’s rivals. According to some studies, mentioned in literature review, such relatedness can be observed. As we state that in a Russian market of digital ecosystem there are certain players, we can call them competitors to each other. Although they have different initial industry affiliation, we state that they now are almost direct competitors due to their current state of product line and brand positioning. M&A deals affiliation with ecosystem creation is positively related with financial performance of the acquirers. The dummy variable “ecosystem or not” must be included in the analysis of acquirer abnormal return. We can state that there is a probability that elevated interest about ecosystems now can be observed on financial markets also.   These hypothesizes are either based on different other researches or on core idea of the research – to study the financial performance of M&A in digital ecosystems. However, there are also stated some other objectives, that must be reached.  Objectives of the research: To review approaches of post-M&A performance evaluation, review current state of Russian digital ecosystem creation processes and choose suitable methodology to determine how M&A effect performance of acquirers who build ecosystems. To explore relationship between M&A effect on performance and different factors of the deal, including general deal metadata and some proposed dummy-variables To investigate such relatedness with short-term financial performance To investigate such relatedness with long-term financial performance To explore such relationship not only for the acquirers, but also for their rivals in the sphere of digital ecosystem creation. To analyze relatedness of M&A deals affiliation with ecosystem creation and long-term and short-term performance of the acquirers’ rivals. The dummy variable “ecosystem or not” must be included in the analysis of the acquirer’s rivals abnormal returns.  To analyze relatedness of performance of the of acquirer and the acquirer’s method of acquisition (directly and not through subsidiary). The dummy variable “directly or through subsidiary” must be included in the analysis of the acquirers’ abnormal returns. To analyze relatedness of performance of the M&A deals of Russian digital ecosystem creators depends on initial industry affiliation of the acquirer. The dummy variable “initial industry affiliation” must be included in the analysis of the acquirers’ abnormal returns.  To analyze relatedness of performance of the acquirer and performance after previous deal.     
The main research question is: what is the effect of M&A deals on company's Financial Performance in Russian digital Ecosystems? The research hypothesises are related to the question and are analyzed using t-test and linear regression analysis. The main hypothesis is that M&A deals have an effect on short-term and long-term Financial Performance of the developers (ecosystem creators). The main hypothesis is that such relatedness can be observed.