How do firms protect their human capital? We test whether firms facing an increased threat of being acquired strengthen their antitakeover provisions (ATPs) in order to bond with their employees. We use the adoption of the Inevitable Disclosure Doctrine (IDD) by US state courts, which exogenously decreases knowledge-worker mobility, thus elevating takeover risk and reducing employee incentives to innovate. Firms respond to the IDD adoption by strengthening ATPs that defend against hostile takeovers, especially when they have greater ex-ante employee mobility and human capital and place greater importance on employee relations. We find no evidence that managers strengthen ATPs for entrenchment or takeover bargaining purposes in this setting. Our findings show that ATPs can be used to credibly commit to employees in order to protect long-term value creation.

企业如何保护其人力资本？我们测试了面临越来越多的被收购威胁的公司是否会加强其反收购规定（ATP），以便与员工建立联系。我们使用美国各州法院采用的“不可避免的披露原则”（IDD），这会外在地降低知识型员工的流动性，从而提高接管风险并降低员工创新的动力。对于IDD的采用，企业通过加强ATP来抵御敌意的接管，特别是当它们具有更大的事前员工流动性和人力资本，并且更加重视员工关系时。在这种情况下，我们找不到证据表明管理者会加强ATP的保护或收购谈判目的。