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Call for Papers

Mergers and Acquisitions, Entrepreneurship and Innovation

Deadline: December 1, 2015

Expected Publication: August 2016

Guest Editors:

Yaakov Weber

Director, Research Unit

School of Business Administration

College of Management, Israel

and

President, EMRBI

EuroMed Research Business Institute

www.emrbi.org

Shlomo Tarba

Head of Department of Strategy & International Business
Birmingham Business School

The University of Birmingham

One of the main reasons for mergers and acquisitions (M&A) is to gain access to technological assets in domestic and foreign markets (Weber, Tarba and Oberg, 2014). In the current dynamic landscape of rapid technological changes established companies pursue M&A to renew their resources, technical capabilities and products, spur innovation, penetrate international markets, and thus, change the rules of competition and achieve strategic renewal (e.g., Gomes, Angwin, Weber, and Tarba, 2013; Gomes, Weber, Brown, and Tarba, 2011; Graebner and Eisenhardt, 2004; Almor, Tarba, and Margalit, 2014; Santos and Eisenhardt, 2009). For example, large established firms like Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Intel, Lucent, and Cisco acquired young, entrepreneurial technology-based firms. For example, entrepreneurial firm with venture capital funding produce more inventions per investments than large firms in the related industries (Kortum & Lerner, 2000). However, mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in general and international M&A in particular are inherently risky and may fail to provide the expected value and performance (Weber and Tarba, 2011; 2013; 2014). In many cases, the acquirer attempt to combine capabilities in commercialization, distribution, logistic and manufacturing with the innovation capabilities of entrepreneurial firms. Yet, in technological M&A, buyers often discover that integration process can destroy the innovative capabilities that made the entrepreneurial firm attractive in the first place (Puranam, Singh & Zollo, 2006; Weber and Tarba, 2012).

This volume of Technology, Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Competitive Strategy is devoted to research aimed at understanding success and failure factors of mergers and acquisitions of entrepreneurial firms. Research topics might include but are not limited to studies that offer insights into the relationships of various factors to performance, in all stage of M&A such as planning, negotiation and post-merger integration (Weber, 2012). Studies with multidisciplinary approach and cross cultural approach are also welcomed. 

We welcome contributions that tackle these and related issues from a variety of theoretical and empirical perspectives. Contributions may take a range of forms, may focus on different levels of analysis, and may employ both quantitative and qualitative approaches.

Submission Guidelines

All papers submitted must represent original research not previously published elsewhere. Depending on the scope that you wish to present, the chapter should be approximately 30-40 double-spaced pages including any illustrations, figures, tables and graphs. References to other publications must be in APA 6th Edition reference style.

All copyedited submissions will be subject to in-depth review, and editorial decisions and revision requests will be communicated to authors.

Yaakov Weber yweber@bezeqint.net

Shlomo Tarba s.tarba@bham.ac.uk