IBS Lunchtime Research Seminar - Diversification Strategies among Business Group and M-form Firms and Firm Performance Implications: Unravelling the Effects of Institutional Transitions and Family Ownership

You are cordially invited to attend an IBS lunchtime research seminar by Dr Saptarshi Purkayastha, Associate Professor of Strategy at the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta. Please join us in Room 108, Henley Business School. If you have not received the email invite please email Angie Clark.

Please make sure you let me know in advance if you intend to attend in person so that the correct amount of catering is booked.

Title: Diversification Strategies among Business Group and M-form Firms and Firm Performance Implications: Unravelling the Effects of Institutional Transitions and Family Ownership

Date: Wednesday 24th May 2023

Time: 13.00 – 14.15pm

Teams – A Teams link to the seminar is included for those who cannot attend in person, however attendance in person is preferred.

Abstract:

Our study examines the effects of the business group (BG) form of organisational structure and the M-form divisional structure on corporate and business-level diversification strategies as institutional development progresses in an emerging country. Despite the progressive reduction in institutional voids consequent to institutional transitions, consistent patterns in the structure-strategy-performance relationships seemingly persist across time. This puzzling finding can be explained by the influence of ongoing family ownership, which might be hampering the firm’s ability to adapt. The findings suggest that unrelated diversification strategies led to better firm performance when they were undertaken with BG structures. In contrast, related diversification strategies that were undertaken at the firm (i.e., SBU) level by M-form firms resulted in better firm performance. This pattern of results persisted over the study’s time frame (2003 to 2016), despite the institutional environment in an emerging country having undergone market-oriented transformations and rapid regulatory changes.

Keywords: Business Group Structures, M-form Structures, Diversification Strategy, Performance, Institutional transitions, Family ownership