Corporate diversification: the impact of foreign competition, industry globalization, and product diversification

2007 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 115-132 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margarethe F. Wiersema ◽  
Harry P. Bowen
2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 49 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rashid Mehmood ◽  
Ahmed Hunjra ◽  
Muhammad Chani

We examined the impact of corporate diversification and financial structure on the firms’ financial performance. We collected data from 520 manufacturing firms from Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh. We used panel data of 14 years from 2004–2017 to analyze the results. We applied a two-step dynamic panel approach to analyze the hypotheses. We found that product diversification and geographic diversification significantly affected the firms’ financial performance. We further found that dividend policy and capital structure had a significant impact on the firm’s financial performance.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Shuang Wu ◽  
Xilian Deng

Solvency is the premise of the sustainable management of insurance companies. Among factors that affect the solvency of insurance companies, diversification strategy is one that cannot be ignored. To study the impact of diversification on the solvency of property-liability insurance companies and how diversification will influence companies with different ownership, this paper adopts the dynamic panel GMM model and the unbalanced panel data from 2009 to 2015. The analysis is from two dimensions: product diversification and geographic diversification. Empirical study shows that product diversification will increase the solvency of Chinese-funded property-liability insurance companies but reduce the solvency of foreign-funded ones. As for the impact of geographic diversification on solvency, the more geographically diversified the premium income of Chinese-funded property-liability insurance companies are, the lower their solvency will be. However, geographical expansion has no significant solvency-related impact on foreign-funded property-liability insurance companies in China.


2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 360-378 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ranjitha Ajay ◽  
R Madhumathi

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the impact of earnings management on capital structure across firm diversification strategies. Design/methodology/approach – The study focuses on firms operating in the manufacturing sector (diversified and focused). Panel data methodology compares diversification strategies and identifies the impact of diversification strategy with earnings management practices on capital structure decision. Findings – International and product diversified firms have lower levels of leverage than focused firms in their capital structure. Asset-based earnings management is positive for diversified (market/product) firms. Earnings management using discretionary expenditure (project based) is found to be higher for market diversified but product-focused firms. Earning smoothing method is found to be significant for focused firms and shows a negative relationship with capital structure. Originality/value – This study offers an insight into the relationship between corporate diversification, earnings management and capital structure decisions of manufacturing firms. The results provide an important contribution to accounting and strategy literature. A distinction is made between market- and product-diversified firms and influence of earnings management practices (asset-based, project-based and earnings smoothing (ESM)) on capital structure decisions. Diversified firms (market/product) tend to have lower levels of leverage than focused firms and earnings management practices within firm groups significantly influence the capital structure decisions.


2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Basri Basri

The objective of the study was to evaluate the impact of stores existence toward sales turnover of stalls in Mataram city. Associative research design was adopted as the study guide. Purposive sampling techniques were used in which 100 copies of the research instrument were administered to stalls owner in Mataram city, out of which 100 copies of questionnaire were filled and returned. Test of validity and reliability, classical assumption test, and multiple linear regression analysis was used to analyse the data generated from respondents. The findings revealed that stores existence variable consisted of services, product diversification, price, and comfortable of consumer have significant influence on sales turnover of stalls at 0,05 level (2-tailed). The result of the research shows the variables negatively affecting sales turnover of stalls. Furthermore, price ranks the first follow by comfortable, product diversification, and services. This research will help the owner of stalls to understand and recognize the ranking of variables affecting sales turnover of stalls in Mataram city. Keywords:   Stores Existence, Stall, and Sales Turnover.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Liridon Kryeziu ◽  
Recai Coşkun ◽  
Besnik Krasniqi

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of family firms’ types of social networks on internationalisation. By investigating the mechanisms and the process and complexity regarding the operation, function and impact of social networks, this paper aims to gain insights and understand the dynamism concerning the content, and process as well as build rich and detailed construct analysis. Design/methodology/approach This study used a qualitative case study as a research strategy to examine the impact of social networks on family firm internationalisation. A qualitative research strategy was used as the impact of networking relations and structure is challenging to be measured statistically. Findings The findings suggest that family firm internationalisation was gradual and characterised by an incremental learning process. This process facilitated the networking relations and structures that helped firms improve their quality, product diversification and set competitive prices. Research limitations/implications This study’s first limitation is that it focused mainly on low technology manufacturing firms. This paper recommends examining how high technology firms maximise social networks. Secondly, this paper examined family firms; therefore, this paper recommends comparing and contrasting networking relations and family and nonfamily firms' social structure. Thirdly, being limited only to social networks, this study did not focus on the impact of ownership; this paper suggests future studies to examine family ownership and involvement in firm internationalisation. Originality/value Understanding how firms’ social network types influence family firms’ internationalisation in a transition economy is critical to ensuring family businesses’ expansion. This study explains how family firms use social networks to internationalise, extending the current understanding of family business literature in transition economies. It also provides implications for policymakers and family firms managers for improving the growth prospects of family businesses.


2012 ◽  
pp. 87-103
Author(s):  
Claudio Giachetti

Despite much ado about the effectiveness of ‘product' diversification, there is very limited knowledge about the impact of ‘service' diversification on firm performance. By taking a resource-based perspective, this study explores the service diversificationperformance relationship. Results show a consistent inverse U-shaped relationship between service diversification and firm performance, with the slope positive at low and moderate levels of service diversification but negative at high levels of service diversification. Moreover, results show that competitive intensity negatively moderates the relationship between service diversification and performance, while the moderating effect of firm's size is not significant. Hypotheses are tested with data on 52 Italian facility management firms over the 2000-2009 time period.


2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohd Azrai Azman ◽  
Carol K.H. Hon ◽  
Bo Xia ◽  
Boon L. Lee ◽  
Martin Skitmore

PurposeMany large construction firms (LCFs) adopt product diversification (PD) to counter downturns and spread risks. However, no detailed information is available concerning the type of PD that improves their performance. In addition, it is still uncertain how much changes in institutional dimensions influence the effectiveness of PD. Therefore, the aim is to resolve this issue by establishing a model that shows the extent of this influence.Design/methodology/approachThe generalised method of moments (GMM) estimator is used to model the PD strategies of 86 LCFs in Malaysia over 14 years (2003–2016) and its impact on productivity and profitability performance.FindingsUnrelated diversification (UD) decreased firm performance in 2003–2016, while related diversification (RD) had a positive impact during the more liberal 2010–2016 phase. The models show that the impact of PD is highly dependent on changes in institutional dimensions.Practical implicationsFirstly, managers may adjust the type of PD and its level of diversification to improve firm performance. Secondly, they may devise PD strategies based on changes in institutional dimensions to maximise their effectiveness.Originality/valueThe study contributes to the literature by determining the optimal amount of PD (including RD and UD) and its impact on performance. Secondly, the study is the first to investigate the moderating relationship of the institutional dimensions of economic and regulatory institutions on PD-firm performance. Thirdly, the study is the first to explore the components of technical-scale-scope economies (movement towards and around the production frontier), this being crucial to the strategy that was only conjectured in previous studies.


2013 ◽  
Vol 103 (6) ◽  
pp. 2554-2584 ◽  
Author(s):  
Swati Dhingra

Firms face competing needs to expand product variety and reduce production costs. Access to larger markets enables innovation to reduce costs. Although firm scale increases, foreign competition reduces markups. Firms' ability to recapture lost markups depends on the interplay between within-firm competition and across-firm competition. Narrowing product variety eases within-firm competition but lowers market share. I provide a theory detailing the impact of trade policy on product and process innovation. Unbundling innovation provides new insights into welfare gains and innovation policy. Product innovation increases welfare beyond standard gains from trade. The relative returns to innovation policy change with trade liberalization. (JEL D24, F13, O31)


Author(s):  
Margarethe F. Wiersema ◽  
Joseph B. Beck

Corporate or product diversification represents a strategic decision. Specifically, it addresses the strategic question regarding in which businesses the firm will compete. A single-business company that expands its strategic scope by adding new businesses becomes a diversified, multibusiness company. The means by which a company expands its strategic scope is by acquiring businesses, investing in the development of new businesses, or both. Similarly, an already diversified firm can reduce its strategic scope by divesting from or closing businesses. There are two fundamentally different types of corporate diversification strategy, depending on the interrelatedness of the businesses in the company’s portfolio: related diversification and unrelated diversification. Related diversification occurs when the businesses in the company’s portfolio share strategic assets or resources, such as technology, a brand name, or distribution channels. Unrelated diversification occurs when a company’s businesses do not share strategic assets or resources and do not have interrelationships of strategic importance. Companies can pursue both types of diversification simultaneously, and thus have a portfolio of businesses both related and unrelated. In addition to variations in the type of diversification, companies can vary in the extent of their diversification, ranging from business portfolios with very limited diversification to highly diversified portfolios. Decisions regarding the diversification strategy of a firm represent major strategic scope decisions since they impact the markets and industries in which the company will compete. Companies can increase or reduce their level of diversification for a variety of reasons. Economic motives, for example, include the pursuit of economies of multiproduct scale and scope, whereby per-unit costs may be lowered through the increase in sales volume or other fixed-cost reducing benefits associated with growth through diversification. In addition, companies may diversify for strategic reasons, such as enhancement of capabilities or superior competitive positioning through entry into new product markets. Similarly, economic and strategic reasons can motivate the firm to refocus and reduce its level of diversification when the strategic and economic rationales for being in a particular business are no longer justified. The performance consequences of corporate diversification can vary, depending on both the extent of the firm’s diversification and the type of diversification. In general, research indicates that high levels of diversification are value-destroying due to the integrative and complexity-associated costs that administering an extremely diversified portfolio imposes on management. Nevertheless, related diversification, where the company shares underlying resources across its business portfolio (e.g., brand, technology, and distribution channels), can lead to higher levels of performance than can unrelated diversification, due to the potential for enhanced profitability from leveraging shared resources. Corporate diversification was a major U.S. business trend in the 1960s. During the 1980s, however, pressure from the capital market for shareholder wealth maximization led to the adoption of strategies whereby many companies refocused their business portfolios and thus reduced their levels of corporate diversification by divesting unrelated businesses in order to concentrate on their predominant or core business.


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