Can corporate entrepreneurship attributes in acquired firms avoid their acquisition-turned-divestiture fate?

摘要

More than 50% acquisitions are divested within the first year of operation. Data shows that the divestitures lacked adequate level of corporate entrepreneurship, hence, faced significant hurdles in getting integrated. We argue that presence of corporate entrepreneurship attributes in acquired firms is vital for their successful integration with their acquirers. The acquirers are less likely to divest such acquisitions that continue to demonstrate the culture of corporate entrepreneurship even after getting acquired, more specifically, during their post-acquisition integration stages. While most studies have focused on the 'process' dimension of managing post-acquisition integration, we intend to explore this largely unattended dimension, namely, 'corporate entrepreneurship level' of acquired entrepreneurial firms. In this study, we used Stopford & Baden-Fuller's (1994) two of the five 'bundles' of attributes for creating corporate entrepreneurship to explore how these attributes impact the overall efficiency of integration, and therefore, predict the likely status during post-acquisition integration stages. Connecting corporate entrepreneurship literature with M&A literature will be our contribution toward developing practical implication for entrepreneurial firms who are in the process of preparing themselves for a successful continuity or exit through M&A route, and also, for acquirers who are on the lookout for complimentary targets.