Dissertation Defense Announcement

Fogelman College of Business and Economics announces the Final Dissertation Defense of

Tong Hyouk Kang

for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy

March 26, 2019 at 12:00 PM in Fogelman College of Business, Room 264 

Advisor: Frances Fabian

Entry Mode Strategy, Management Control and Foreign Subsidiary Performance: The case of Korean Multinational Corporations 

ABSTRACT: Ownership control through equity ownership-based entry mode strategies of multinational corporations (MNCs) and their foreign subsidiary performance have received increased attention from scholars over the past decades. However, previous research has reported mixed findings on subsidiary performance outcomes. This research, therefore, addresses some of these findings by combining ownership control and operational control via staffing parent country nationals to consider performance. Specifically, I investigated the moderating effects of the high-tech industry and cultural distance on this relationship. Using an unbalanced panel sample of 3,071 Korean MNCs' foreign subsidiaries (11,281 subsidiary-year observations across 49 countries from 2007 to 2013), I found evidence that wholly owned subsidiaries (i.e., higher levels of ownership control) perform better than joint ventures (i.e., lower levels of ownership control) when there is a higher level of operational control. Although the high cultural distance between home and destination country lowers overall subsidiary performance, the relations described above holds in both high and low cultural distance conditions. However, evidence indicated that there is no difference between a greenfield mode and acquisition mode. Based on these findings, I provide implications and suggest ideas for future research.