Configuration and Co-ordination of Value Activities in German Multinational Corporations

Dirk Holtbrügge

European Management Journal, 2005, vol. 23, issue 5, 564-575

Abstract: Multinational Corporations (MNCs) integrate their value activities more and more into a world-wide corporate strategy. This is characterized by a high level of functional specialization and diverse resource interdependencies between their sub-units. To cope with the resulting need for cross-border coordination, personal and horizontal mechanisms are argued to have a higher efficiency than traditional technocratic and vertical instruments. A study of 66 foreign subsidiaries of large German MNCs reveals at least a medium degree of functional specialization. However, hierarchical coordination mechanisms are still dominant. Both the configuration and coordination of MNCs is influenced by several firm-specific, industry-specific and country-specific conditions. Surprisingly, only a weak relation between configuration and coordination of value activities can be observed.

Keywords: Multinational; corporations; Configuration; Coordination; Cultural; distance; Transnational; corporations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005
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