Offerings That are “Ever-in-the-Making”

Digital ventures are entrepreneurial young firms that introduce new digital artifacts that are “ever-incomplete” and “perpetually-in-the-making” onto the market. The study examines how six digital ventures continued to develop their digital market offerings post launch. Three key designing mechanisms are identified that explain continuous post-launch product development in digital ventures: deploying complementary digital objects, architectural amplification, and porting. The study discusses how these mechanisms advance our understanding of how digital technologies change entrepreneurial processes and outcomes.

The Life Cycle Effects of Corporate Takeover Defenses

We document that the relation between firm value and the use of takeover defenses is positive for young firms but becomes negative as firms age. This value reversal pattern reflects specific changes in the costs and benefits of takeover defenses as firms age and arises because defenses are sticky and rarely removed. Firms can attenuate the value reversal by removing defenses, but do so only when the defenses become very costly and adjustment costs are low. The value reversal explains previous mixed evidence about takeover defenses and implies that firm age proxies for takeover defenses’ heterogeneous impacts on firm value.

Market exits during the pandemic

The new coronavirus pandemic has triggered an economic crisis different from other crises in the acuteness and non-uniformity of its impact on various sectors of the economy. This paper analyzes how the dynamics of firms entering and exiting the market have changed in this environment and which groups of firms have shown to be the most vulnerable to the negative effect of the crisis. Our analysis shows that the number of newly registered firms dwindled sharply in the period of the toughest restrictions imposed to curtail the infection spread in April — May 2020. The recovery which followed in the subsequent months has failed to compensate for the spring’s slump, which may suggest a “scarring impact” of the crisis. July and October 2020 saw a substantial rise in companies’ exits from the market. The crisis has hurt not only the hardest hit industries but also other areas of economic activity. Liquidations rose most extensively among young firms aged less than three years. Relatively higher productivity firms exited less often than lower productivity companies. This may suggest a “cleansing effect” of the crisis. But with the redundant labor being unable to move to more productive firms, the positive effect of the crisis may be brought to naught. Therefore, for the consequences of the crisis to be remedied, incentives should be provided to new firms’ entries and support for efficient companies, especially for young firms showing growth potential. Stimulation of growth in the number of high-productivity firms should go hand in hand with the creation of conditions for new entities’ fast development, expansion, and efficiency enhancement.

Recruiting strategic human capital from MNCs—Does hiring MNC managers enable exporting in domestic firms?

Exporting is a central growth strategy for most firms and managers with international experience are instrumental for export decisions. We suggest that such managers can be hired from Multinational Corporations (MNCs). We integrate theory from strategic human capital research into models explaining export decisions. We theorize that hiring managers from MNCs increases the odds of domestic firms to start exporting and this effect depends on the similarities between hiring firms and MNCs. We hypothesize that young firms will benefit comparatively less from hiring MNC managers. In contrast, firms with internationally diverse workforces and with high degrees of hierarchical specialization will benefit the most from hiring MNC managers. We test and support these hypotheses for 474,926 domestic firms in Sweden, which we observe between 2007 and 2015.

The Life Cycle Effects of Corporate Takeover Defenses

We document that the relation between firm value and the use of takeover defenses is positive for young firms but becomes negative as firms age. This value reversal pattern reflects specific changes in the costs and benefits of takeover defenses as firms age and arises because defenses are sticky and rarely removed. Firms can attenuate the value reversal by removing defenses, but do so only when the defenses become very costly and adjustment costs are low. The value reversal explains previous mixed evidence about takeover defenses and implies that firm age proxies for takeover defenses’ heterogeneous impacts on firm value.