IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/sbusec/v25y2005i1p65-82.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Growth, Diversification, and Business Group Formation in Entrepreneurial Firms

Author

Listed:
  • Donato Iacobucci
  • Peter Rosa

Abstract

Recent empirical research has demonstrated that the growth process of entrepreneurial firms is frequently achieved through the formation of business groups: i.e. a set of companies run by the same entrepreneur (or entrepreneurial team). This has been hypothesised as result of a growth process by diversification of the original activity. This entrepreneurial growth process offers an alternative explanation for the formation of business Groups, than that arising from managerial efficiency and expediency. The main aim of the article is to explore group formation through entrepreneurial diversification using a sample of high growth entrepreneurial firms. The analysis demonstrates that the running of a group of companies by the same entrepreneur is not only induced by the geographical extension of their operation and by diversification but also by the differentiation policy aimed at serving different market segments within the same sector. This seems to contrast with the diversification policy and organisational setting of large, managerial firms Copyright Springer 2005

Suggested Citation

  • Donato Iacobucci & Peter Rosa, 2005. "Growth, Diversification, and Business Group Formation in Entrepreneurial Firms," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 25(1), pages 65-82, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:sbusec:v:25:y:2005:i:1:p:65-82
    DOI: 10.1007/s11187-005-4258-8
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11187-005-4258-8
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11187-005-4258-8?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jacquemin, Alexis P & Berry, Charles H, 1979. "Entropy Measure of Diversification and Corporate Growth," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(4), pages 359-369, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Matthias Firgo & Peter Mayerhofer, 2015. "Wissens-Spillovers und regionale Entwicklung - welche strukturpolitische Ausrichtung optimiert des Wachstum?," Working Paper Reihe der AK Wien - Materialien zu Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft 144, Kammer für Arbeiter und Angestellte für Wien, Abteilung Wirtschaftswissenschaft und Statistik.
    2. Boyan Jovanovic, 1993. "The Diversification of Production," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 24(1 Microec), pages 197-247.
    3. Abhirup Chakrabarti, 2015. "Organizational adaptation in an economic shock: The role of growth reconfiguration," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(11), pages 1717-1738, November.
    4. Claudine Gartenberg & Julie Wulf, 2017. "Pay Harmony? Social Comparison and Performance Compensation in Multibusiness Firms," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 28(1), pages 39-55, February.
    5. Singh, Manohar & Nejadmalayeri, Ali & Mathur, Ike, 2007. "Performance impact of business group affiliation: An analysis of the diversification-performance link in a developing economy," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 60(4), pages 339-347, April.
    6. Nissan, Edward & Carter, George, 2010. "States' Nonagricultural Employment at the 3-Digit North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) Level," Journal of Regional Analysis and Policy, Mid-Continent Regional Science Association, vol. 40(1), pages 1-13.
    7. Kim, Kong-Hee & Al-Shammari, Hussam A. & Kim, Bongjin & Lee, Seung-Hyun, 2009. "CEO duality leadership and corporate diversification behavior," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 62(11), pages 1173-1180, November.
    8. Rajat Mishra & Randy Napier & Mahmut Yasar, 2019. "Do competitors respond to capacity changes? Evidence from U.S. manufacturers," Operations Management Research, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 159-172, December.
    9. Zander, Ivo, 1997. "Technological diversification in the multinational corporation--historical evolution and future prospects," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 209-227, May.
    10. Martin Woerter, 2009. "Industry diversity and its impact on the innovation performance of firms," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 19(5), pages 675-700, October.
    11. Xu, Kai & Hitt, Michael A. & Dai, Li, 2020. "International diversification of family-dominant firms: Integrating socioemotional wealth and behavioral theory of the firm," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 55(3).
    12. Sun, Xing & Lin, Minzhen & Zhong, Huaming, 2024. "The motivation and impact of polluting Enterprises' diversifications: Quasi-natural experiments from environmental protection interview," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    13. Edward Nissan & George Carter, 2011. "The Largest Trans-nationals of Developing Economies," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 39(1), pages 71-83, March.
    14. Enrico Guzzini & Donato Iacobucci, 2012. "Firm size and unrelated diversification. An empirical test on the ‘survivalist hypothesis’," Working Papers 1207, c.MET-05 - Centro Interuniversitario di Economia Applicata alle Politiche per L'industria, lo Sviluppo locale e l'Internazionalizzazione.
    15. Dierk Schmid & Swetlana Renner & Daniel Hoop, 2023. "Exploring within- and between-effects of the factors influencing off-farm work decisions in Switzerland," Agricultural Economics, Czech Academy of Agricultural Sciences, vol. 69(10), pages 416-425.
    16. Mushtaq Hussain Khan, & Ahmad Fraz & Arshad Hassan, 2016. "The Diversification Puzzle: The Role of Asymmetric Information and Insider Trading in Pakistan," Lahore Journal of Economics, Department of Economics, The Lahore School of Economics, vol. 21(2), pages 97-119, July-Dec.
    17. Chih-Hsing Sam Liu & Jun-You Lin & Sheng-Fang Chou, 2022. "Wielding a double-edged sword? JV investment geographic diversity and parent's innovation," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 16(6), pages 1783-1816, August.
    18. Aparna Bhatia & Anu Thakur, 2016. "Diversification Strategies of Multi-national and Domestic Companies in India: A Comparative Evaluation in the Dynamic Environment," Management and Labour Studies, XLRI Jamshedpur, School of Business Management & Human Resources, vol. 41(3), pages 199-215, August.
    19. Venus, Andreas & Engelen, Andreas, 2012. "A strategy perspective on the performance relevance of the CFO," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2012-021, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    20. Eric A. Fong, 2010. "Relative CEO Underpayment and CEO Behaviour Towards R&D Spending," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(6), pages 1095-1122, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    business groups; diversification; entrepreneurship; habitual entrepreneurs; L2; M13;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L2 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior
    • M13 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - New Firms; Startups

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:sbusec:v:25:y:2005:i:1:p:65-82. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.