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No / This paper analyses whether and how organizational learning from diversification experience affects diversification value. Three main findings are reported. First, we find a U-shaped relationship between diversification value and diversification experience. Second, higher similarity in industries of diversifications results in higher diversification value. Finally, value of diversification and temporal interval between diversifications is related an inverted U-shaped curve. In the extension analysis, the paper demonstrates that external learning from others’ experience also affects value of diversification in a cubic pattern. Taken together, the study illustrates the effects learning from both own and population experience on the cross-sectional variance of diversification value.

Both revenues and earnings of diversified firms are increasingly being reported, to the government and the public, on a subentity basis. Adequate criterial foundations do not exist to permit the effective general prescription of specific segment delineations, nor is it known whether such criterial assists can be usefully developed.Demands for segmentation in financial reports are currently intense. Actual reporting practices are largely nonstandardized as to either the definition of segments employed or, the disclosure modes used to present them. Neither conceptual nor theoretical supports are now adequate in guidance to the forms and levels of segmentation activity now required. Prerequisite to effective development of such supports is an-adequate understanding of the corporate diversification phenomenon itself. This dissertation project investigates and analyzes the nature of corporate diversification, as manifested in (1) its historical evolution; (2) general comprehensions of the phenomenon, as evidenced in published opinions and conceptual reasoning schemes of both authoritative experts and lay investors; and (3) formal research by others. Additionally, the results of these investigations and analyses are developed into conceptual schemes and theoretical frameworks, at moderate levels of abstraction.

In spite of the prevalence and strategic importance of diversification for US hospitality firms, research on the effects of diversification has been insufficient in the hospitality literature. Especially, examination of the moderating effect of product or brand diversification on the relationship between geographic diversification and performance of US hospitality firms has been lacking in the hospitality field thus far. This study aims to investigate the effect of each diversification strategy on firm performance for US casino, restaurant, and lodging industries. Further, to investigate effects of diversification comprehensively by incorporating interactions between different diversification strategies, this study attempts to examine the moderating effect of product diversification on the relationship between geographic diversification and performance of US casino firms, and the moderating effect of brand diversification on the relationship between geographic diversification and performance of US restaurant and lodging firms. To accomplish study purposes, this study employs fixed effects and fixed effects instrumental variable regressions analyses, which strictly address the endogeneity problem, thereby enhancing causality between diversification and firm performance. The sample of this study consists of 336 observations of 43 casino firms, 176 observations of 36 lodging firms, and 952 observations of 132 restaurant firms over the period 1993-2010. The study's results indicate a positive and significant effect of geographic diversification on firm performance in the US casino and lodging industry, but an insignificant effect of geographic diversification in the US restaurant industry. For the effect of product and brand diversification, the study's analyses show no significant effect of product diversification on firm performance in the US casino industry, a negative and significant effect of brand diversification in the US restaurant industry, and an insignificant effect of brand diversification in the US lodging industry. Regarding moderating effects, while this study finds an insignificant moderating effect of product diversification on the relationship between geographic diversification and firm performance in the US casino industry, the analyses show a negative and significant moderating effect of brand diversification in the US restaurant industry and a positive and significant moderating effect of brand diversification in the US lodging industry. Findings of this study recommend more prudent decision-making for diversification strategies for US casino firms, brand concentration strategies for US restaurant firms, and acceleration of both geographic and brand diversification for US lodging industry. This study fills a research gap in the hospitality literature by exhaustively examining the effect of diversification strategies on firm performance in the hospitality field by providing evidence for the moderating effects of product and brand diversification on the geographic diversification-firm performance relationship in three US hospitality industries. Further, this study enriches the whole body of diversification theory and literature by providing context-specific empirical findings for diversification's effects and investing the moderating role of brand diversification in the diversification strategy context. / Tourism and Sport

Using a sample of 45,283 firm year observations between 1993–2012, I examine the influence of different types of diversification and M&A accounting on firm value. I find that there are different explanations for earlier variations among documented discounts. I find different value effects for geographical and industrial diversification. These effects vary over time, with decreasing discounts for geographical diversification. Furthermore, I find different value effects of M&A accounting between industries. Controlling for firm fixed effects leads to insignificant results for most regressions, which indicates that underlying firm characteristics play an important role in the determination of the discount. Together, these findings explain earlier documented differences in the literature on the diversification discount.

BACKGROUND: Resolution of the link between micro- and macroevolution calls for comparing both processes on the same deterministic landscape, such as genomic, metabolic or fitness networks. We apply this perspective to the evolution of carotenoid pigmentation that produces spectacular diversity in avian colors and show that basic structural properties of the underlying carotenoid metabolic network are reflected in global patterns of elaboration and diversification in color displays. Birds color themselves by consuming and metabolizing several dietary carotenoids from the environment. Such fundamental dependency on the most upstream external compounds should intrinsically constrain sustained evolutionary elongation of multi-step metabolic pathways needed for color elaboration unless the metabolic network gains robustness - the ability to synthesize the same carotenoid from an additional dietary starting point. RESULTS: We found that gains and losses of metabolic robustness were associated with evolutionary cycles of elaboration and stasis in expressed carotenoids in birds. Lack of metabolic robustness constrained lineage's metabolic explorations to the immediate biochemical vicinity of their ecologically distinct dietary carotenoids, whereas gains of robustness repeatedly resulted in sustained elongation of metabolic pathways on evolutionary time scales and corresponding color elaboration. CONCLUSIONS: The structural link between length and robustness in metabolic pathways may explain periodic convergence of phylogenetically distant and ecologically distinct species in expressed carotenoid pigmentation; account for stasis in carotenoid colors in some ecological lineages; and show how the connectivity of the underlying metabolic network provides a mechanistic link between microevolutionary elaboration and macroevolutionary diversification. REVIEWERS: This article was reviewed by Junhyong Kim, Eugene Koonin, and Fyodor Kondrashov. For complete reports, see the Reviewers' reports section.

The study examines the influence (effects) of export diversification in defining economic growth differences across Africa and it tests its robustness in different samples and estimation techniques compared to other variables of trade namely, trade openness and export growth. It applies an augmented Solow growth model in a cross-section dataset for the period of 1998 to 2009 with all three trade variables tested under a single framework. It is found that countries with more diversified exports generally experienced faster economic growth; therefore, variation in export diversification levels explains the observed growth differences across Africa. The results show that both export diversification and export growth are robust determinants of economic growth rates in the region while trade openness is not. The findings have a strong bearing on trade policy by emphasising the importance of more diversified exports to mitigate the negative impacts of global economic shocks to economic growth in the region.

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"Diversification ist an attractive option for many companies, and is probably one of the most influential ideas affecting American corporate strategy today". Daß diese Äußerung auch für viele bundesdeutsche Unternehmen gilt, zeigen beispielsweise die Diversifikationen der Daimler Benz aG, der VW AG, der Mannesmann AG und andere mehr. Leider sind nicht alle durchgeführten Diversifikationen mit Erfolg verbunden und es stellen sich z. B. folgende Fragen: Wie können Diversifikationsanstrengungen zum Erfolg geführt werden? Welche Faktoren müssen beachtet werden, wenn in einen neuen Markt diversifiziert werden soll? Welches sind die kritischen Erfolgsfaktoren? Mit welchen Risiken ist im schlimmsten Fall zu rechnen?

Animal phyla vary dramatically in species richness (from one species to >1.2 million), but the causes of this variation remain largely unknown. Animals have also evolved striking variation in morphology and ecology, including sessile marine taxa lacking heads, eyes, limbs, and complex organs (e.g., sponges), parasitic worms (e.g., nematodes, platyhelminths), and taxa with eyes, skeletons, limbs, and complex organs that dominate terrestrial ecosystems (arthropods, chordates). Relating this remarkable variation in traits to the diversification and richness of animal phyla is a fundamental yet unresolved problem in biology. Here, we test the impacts of 18 traits (including morphology, ecology, reproduction, and development) on diversification and richness of extant animal phyla. Using phylogenetic multiple regression, the best-fitting model includes five traits that explain approximate to 74% of the variation in diversification rates (dioecy, parasitism, eyes/photoreceptors, a skeleton, nonmarine habitat). However, a model including just three (skeleton, parasitism, habitat) explains nearly as much variation (approximate to 67%). Diversification rates then largely explain richness patterns. Our results also identify many striking traits that have surprisingly little impact on diversification (e.g., head, limbs, and complex circulatory and digestive systems). Overall, our results reveal the key factors that shape large-scale patterns of diversification and richness across >80% of all extant, described species.