Multiunit Organization and Multimarket Strategy

by Noel A.C. Baum, H.R. Greve, Joel Baum

Overview

A conspicuous feature of the modern economy is the multitude of multiunit systems that operate in several markets - an organizational form that arguably rivals the "M-form" as the 20th century's most successful. Research traditions studying multiunit systems include the multimarket perspective, which has used commitment and mutual forbearance theory, and the multiunit perspective, which has used learning and knowledge transfer theory. These perspectives are interdisciplinary, but to date there has been little direct interaction among them. This text aims to bring these areas together, discussing such things as: examining how variation in firm capabilities affects the co-ordination of branches and thus their forbearance or transfer of routines; bridging theories of market conduct and internal behaviour to explore how knowledge about markets and competitor behaviour is transferred among organizational units; making a theory of contingent multiunit or single-unit competitive advantage that can account for the coexistence of these organizational forms in many markets; and examining the effects of firm contacts in alliances or technological fields on their competitive behaviours.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780762307210
Publisher:	Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Publication date:	06/15/2001
Series:	Advances in Strategic Management , #18
Edition description:	1ST
Pages:	420
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.86(h) x 1.26(d)

Table of Contents

List of Contributors. Introduction: A multiunit, multimarket world. Ethnic links, location choice and performance: A test of the rural motel industry. Beyond multimarket contact to mutual forbearance: pursuit of multimarket strategy. Tradeoffs in the organization of production: Multiunit firms, geographic dispersion and organizational learning. Interorganizational learning and the dynamics of chain relationships. Dynamics of knowledge transfer among multimarket competitors. Designing multimarket-contact hypothesis tests: Patent citations and multimarket contact in the product and innovation markets of the chemicals industry. Collusion in horizontally connected markets: Multimarket producers as conduits for learning. Getting to multimarket competition: How multimarket contact affects firms' market entry decisions. Strategic management in the new economy: Modern information technologies and multichannel contact strategies. Markets and multiunit firms from an American historical perspective. Racing for market share: Hypercompetition and the performance of multiunit multimarket firms. Multimarket contact: meaning and measurement at multiple levels of analysis.