Advantages Of Franchising

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The main disadvantage associated with franchising is the difficulty to adjust or modify the business operations according to the market response in order to suit the business environment (Arnold, 2003). As in the case of licensing, companies using the franchising concept as an entry mode are limited in terms of financial budget and maintaining control over the franchisee. In addition, this type of expansion strategy creates potential future competitor through the transfer of knowledge and expertise (Cavusgil et al., 2008). Due to the limited data available to represent all possible expansion modes that firms can choose from, the emphasis in this thesis is put on equity expansion strategies. In this paper M&A deals are used as a proxy for market…show more content…
In particular, Chen and Mujtaba (2007) argue that putting the emphasis solely on transaction costs minimization is insufficient to explain an optimal market entry choice since there are other factors that play a vital role in foreign investment decisions and firm performance such as the institutional and cultural environment in the host country. Additionally, Andersen et al. (2014) state that the transaction cost framework is only able to explain decisions between dichotomous entry modes such as equity and non-equity or high control and low control entry modes. Yet, despite the limitation of this approach, Brouthers (2002) as well as Poppo and Zender (1998) find evidence that companies that have based their entry mode choice on a transaction cost model experience notably better performance regarding both financial and non-financial…show more content…
In particular, Sharma and Erramilli (2004) suggest that firm-specific resources allow companies to build a competitive advantage and thus to successfully compete in foreign markets. They classify these resources into tangible, including all physical assets and equipment, and intangible, such as brand name and image, know-how and intellectual property or proprietary technology. As stated by Cumberland (2006), firms that own a wide range of valuable resources can pay the expenses of international expansion. Therefore, they often pursue global diversification into countries where their available resource capacity matches the market demand. According to this resource-based view, what determines the level of a firm’s competitive advantage is its ability to transfer and utilize their valuable resources on the target market in the most efficient and effective way possible (Sharma and Erramilli, 2004). Thus, firms select their entry mode strategy in respect to the resources they own. Since collaboration with a local partner requires that firms protect their firm-specific resources and capabilities, the most favourable foreign market entry in the resource-based theory is considered to be through wholly owned operations, whereas shared control entry modes are the most preferred when
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