Conformity in board characteristics and ownership structure of Taiwanese IC design firms

• Main Authors: Ying-Hui Li, 李盈慧
• Other Authors: Yu-Shu Peng
• Format: Others
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2008
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/973645

碩士 === 國立東華大學 === 國際企業學系 === 96 === Previous studies of mimetic behaviors focus on explaining the choices, such as market position, entry mode, and equity joint venture. Surprisingly, the board characteristics and ownership structure of conformity or differentiation of start-ups have received less attention in this stream of research. In this study, we demonstrate how the industry-level and the firm-level factors affect the degree of conformity in the board characteristics and ownership structure of start-ups through the lens of institutional theory and competitive strategy theory. Hypotheses are test on a sample of 96 Taiwanese listed corporations in the IC design industry during the period from 1997 to 2007. We find that the industry-level factors drawing from institutional theory are more effective to predict the conformity in board characteristics and ownership structure of high-tech start-ups. In specifics, the board characteristics and ownership structure of high-tech start-ups converge over time; the number of prior founding companies is positively related to the degree of conformity of the board characteristics and ownership structure in start-ups; the degree of conformity glides when the population density and HHI of wafer foundry industry (the community of IC design industry) increase in IC design industry; but firm-level factors all become insignificant toward the influence of conformity. Empirical findings of the present study provide managerial implications in start-ups in IC design industry in particular and theoretical implications in institutional theory.