Linking Market Entry and Firm Growth: When to Enter and Where to Grow?

Abstract

This proposed symposium offers new insights on market entry and firm growth by exploring the links between entry and growth, each of which has been studied relatively independently of each other in prior research. In particular, we focus on the role of market characteristics, and bring together a collection of four complementary papers, each examining a different and yet related aspect of the influence of market characteristics on the when and where of market entry and firm growth. Collectively, the papers in the symposium focus on some of the fundamental issues in strategic management related to market entry and firm growth. Specifically, they ask and attempt to answer the following questions: What kind of markets may offer the greatest first-mover advantage (FMA)? For example, do markets with greater competitive rivalry experience larger or smaller FMA? How do the growth paths of individual firms relate to the lifecycle of the industry? To what extent do the competitive interactions between firms influence the pattern of the industry’s geographic growth? Do firms grow faster in markets with greater potential for “softwarization”, which increases the ability of firms to scale assets at low cost? How do the differences in strength of regional imprints affect the growth patterns of different types of organizational forms in an emerging market? For example, does high imprinting of state ownership in a region reduce the growth rate of privatized firms? Addressing these questions will help us narrow the gap in the extant literature by integrating entry and growth as distinct yet closely-connected elements of firm and industry lifecycles. Does Market Rivalry Increase First-Mover Advantage When Entry Order Is Randomized? Presenter: Kubilay Cirik; Purdue U., West Lafayette Presenter: Richard Makadok; Purdue U., West Lafayette On the Geography of Industry Evolution: A Tale of Two Firms Presenter: Natarajan Balasubramanian; Syracuse U. Presenter: Jeongsik Lee; Drexel U. Presenter: Charlotte Ren; Fox School of Business, Temple U. Presenter: Ye Hu; U. of Houston Industry softwarization and entry Presenter: Victor M. Bennett; Duke U. Presenter: Todd Hall; Duke U. Regional Imprinting and the Growth of Privatized Firms Presenter: Fan Xia; Rennes School of Business Presenter: Tammy L. Madsen; Santa Clara U. Presenter: Gordon Walker; Southern Methodist U.