| 14. | Merger, Acquisition and Other Integration Expenses |
In connection with the Merger and other related activities, we incurred significant transaction, integration, and transitional costs in 2011 and 2012 (primarily in 2011). These costs included investment banker advisory fees; legal, tax, accounting and valuation fees; termination and severance costs (both cash and stock based compensation awards) for terminated and transitional employees; non-capitalized system conversion costs and other integration costs.
In 2012, we incurred $80.7 million of costs related principally to severance in connection with the Merger; system implementation costs, as portions of the project move into the phase when the costs are expensed (i.e., training and data conversion); additional costs due to the liquidation of PEPR and severance and related costs due to organizational changes in Europe to centralize finance activities and gain efficiencies. In 2011, we incurred $140.5 million of costs related principally to transaction and transitional costs directly related to the Merger, including severance, and transactional costs associated with the PEPR Acquisition. At the time of the Merger, we terminated our existing credit facilities and wrote-off the remaining unamortized deferred loan costs associated with such facilities, which is included in these costs.