The creation and transfer of entrepreneurship in emerging economies of the world. An approach through large family-owned corporations of China, Mexico and Brazil

This article analyses the process of creation and transfer of entrepreneurial competitive advantages in large family firms of three dynamic emerging economies of the 21st century: Brazil, Mexico and China. It does so by studing path dependencies and the creation of dynamic capabilities in three case studies: Pao de Açúcar (Brazil), Grupo Carso (Mexico) and Hutchison Whampoa (China). The interdisciplinary perspective of the article enables a long-term analysis of entrepreneurship, and facilitates the study of one important topic of debate in family business studies: the generational transfer of the so-called entrepreneurial spirit. The results of the article show on the one hand that existing historically determined institutions ruling local and global markets, and also inherited practices and values, have highly conditioned the strategies used to create and transfer entrepreneurship between generations in some of the largest family firms in Brazil, China and Mexico

Standing the test of time: External factors influencing family firm longevity in Germany and Spain during the twentieth century

While most research on family business longevity focuses on how internal corporate governance issue impact resilience, the aim of this article is to foreground the relevance of external environmental factors, and to do so in an internationally comparative perspective. By historically comparing the largest family businesses in Germany and Spain in the twentieth century, we find that they differ significantly in age and ask how external factors help us better understand these variances. After analysing the institutional framework of the two countries during the second part of the 20th century, we explore the strategic responses developed in reaction to that framework by four of the largest family businesses in the two countries. With this, we strive to capture the interdependent nature of internal decision-making processes and external environmental changes, ultimately arguing for a more holistic understanding of family business resilience over time