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Purpose – The question of whether the corporate governance practices of firms in diverse countries are converging to those of U.S. firms, and the extent of convergence or divergence, is examined.

Design/methodology/approach – Company level governance measures of board structure and organization, firm audit attributes, antitakeover defenses, and compensation design attributes of international firms are compared with those of U.S. firms.

Findings – We find that the evidence for convergence is more mixed than previously believed, with firms in some nations converging, others essentially static, and a number diverging from U.S. practices. We further determine that country factors such as measures of national economic freedom, increased shareholder rights, and impartial judiciaries help to explain convergence. Greater participation by banks in the national economy is associated with greater divergence from U.S. governance standards. Firm characteristics which are suggestive of a future need for external equity encourage convergence while those which capture the use of leverage or the ability to service additional debt are correlated with greater divergence.

Research limitations/implications – This study suggests that inquiry into whether convergence is occurring might be the wrong question to ask. Rather, our findings suggest that the research focus should be shifted toward an inquiry of what specific areas of governance are converging and in what countries or regions.

Originality/value – This study helps to describe what constitutes effective corporate governance design for firms worldwide. It provides managers with insights on how governance mechanisms can be tailored to reflect local practices and laws.

There continues to be much interest in the impact of internal funds on the level of corporate investment activity. While some studies provide evidence that investment decisions of firms that are financially constrained are more sensitive to the availability of internal funds than those of less constrained firms, other studies show the opposite, i.e. investment decisions of the most credit-worthy firms are most sensitive to internal funds availability. This paper tests these opposing propositions for U.S. firms using data for a longer and more recent period than in prior studies. The results support the latter view, i.e. investments at financially constrained firms are less sensitive to internal cash flows than in financially less constrained firms. Regardless, investments levels are found to be positively related to internal cash flows for all types of firms and for all periods examined indicating a pecking order in financing (firms prefer first using internal funds and only then go to external funds).

Catering business is one of the most prominent and sought-after business investment in Dehradun, given the number of people who have a busy lifestyle. This fact gets more influential as Shugan Group is a catering company that serves the Dehradun market, a valley in the foothills of Shivalik Mountain Range in the state of Uttarakhand. Dehradun enjoys the benefit of being the Capital of Uttarakhand. The catering companies offer a lot of employment while promising delicious food to the stakeholders. Many individuals rely on this sector through food trucks, small shops or through full-fledged catering service providing companies. The group offers innovative and interesting food options for Doonites through their catering services including a lot of regional food options. Traditionally, the catering services in the town comprises handful options to deliver in the form of just food items. The catering services now involve a lot of service elements also including serving of the dishes, ambience and all inclusive of personnel factors. Many individuals assume that mess food is everyday kind of boring food. This assumption definitely holds true throughout the student community who are the major benefactors of the catering services as Dehradun is an education hub in the country. The new food offerings therefore face a lot of change as some of the ingredients definitely are the everyday incorporated ones. In the past couple of years, the catering services concept had gained acceptance for investment because of rise in demand for variety to be provisioned in the offerings as students hold diverse demographical differences. A lot of significance has been given to the likeness of various food options. Shugan Group wishes to inject a new life into the student catering market, leveraging the culinary skills of their handpicked chefs to develop creative new catering options. The advanced skills of chefs, industry insight of the group and an already existing market opportunity will allow the group to showcase its potential. Shugan Group is a start-up company. Marketing is critical to its success and future profitability. It offers creative gourmet for mess catering for a wide range of events and everyday eating options. The basic market need is high quality and creative food options. Having worked in the industry for the past few years and witnessing the dynamic environment including rise in disposable incomes, rise in consumer awareness, consumer’s keenness to eat new delicacies every day and desire to purchase quality food, the group has invested a lot in understanding what the consumers want. The performance of the group has been moderately incremental. After holding qualitative wisdom on the requirements of the market, Shugan Group is currently in the speculative stage in terms of being a caterer. The group wishes to reasonably understand the option that it should consciously adopt in terms of being modest about thinking only of financial benefit, with reasonable expansion every year only for the sake of being financially viable or build a strong brand and start getting people to increase word of mouth thereby bringing organic growth.

This chapter complements the one that appeared as “History of the AIB Fellows: 1975–2008” in Volume 14 of this series (International Business Scholarship: AIB Fellows on the First 50 Years and Beyond, Jean J. Boddewyn, Editor). It traces what happened under the deanship of Alan Rugman (2011–2014) who took many initiatives reported here while his death in July 2014 generated trenchant, funny, and loving comments from more than half of the AIB Fellows. The lives and contributions of many other major international business scholars who passed away from 2008 to 2014 are also evoked here: Endel Kolde, Lee Nehrt, Howard Perlmutter, Stefan Robock, John Ryans, Vern Terpstra, and Daniel Van Den Bulcke.

This chapter elaborates the concept of Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) and further validates the model for the sustainability of financial innovation using factors of e-payment system, adoption intention, trust and sustainability, and finally derives a model for the sustainability of the financial innovation using SEM. The chapter also presents Sustainability of E-payment System on Customer Perspective (SEPSCP) through segmentation approach.

This chapter investigates whether core competence of managers and their expansive (vs. specialized) managerial style affects firms' innovative ability, capacity, and efficiency. Using exogenous CEO departures as a natural experiment, it establishes a causal link between managerial capability and innovation. Importantly, it reveals that firms with talented managers receive significantly more nonself citations; make significantly lower self-citations and lesser citations to the others, indicating novel and explorative innovation achievements. Also, managers with higher general (specialized) ability are cited more (less) by patents from a wider range of fields. Lastly, career concern is identified as a mechanism linking higher ability and innovation.

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, India's tourism industry has the opportunity to further grow and expand through the development and implementation of sustainable policies. The diversity of India's geography is observed in its weather which is variable both spatially and temporally throughout the year. Seasonal changes in weather influence the number of foreign tourists arrivals in India. Consequently, significant reductions in visitor numbers are observed during the monsoon season. In future decades, the changing climate has the potential to shape tourism patterns. Warmer temperatures and an increased frequency of high-intensity rainfall are the two most common predictions concerning future climate in India. It will result in a shorter winter tourism season in the northern states where the cold weather enables winter sports activities such as skiing and snowboarding. Coastal tourism along India's stretched coastline may become less attractive to tourists due to damage and disruption to coral reefs and marine wildlife. Sea-level rise and coastal erosion may push beach tourists to more desirable and scenic destinations. India's transport infrastructure is key to enabling the safe and efficient movement of tourists around the country. The current weather is already impacting the air, road and rail networks and, further challenges are highly likely due to a changing climate. There is still an opportunity for India's tourism industry to adapt through physical and policy developments. It would make India a more competitive and sustainable tourism destination.

This chapter investigates whether and to what extent tax benefits affect the likelihood of firms undertaking leveraged buyout (LBO) transactions.

With an identified sample of LBO firms and similar non-LBO counterparts, this chapter utilizes staggered changes in state corporate income tax rates as exogenous shocks and adopts a Logistic regression to analyze how these tax changes affect firms' probability of engaging in LBOs.

Firms are more likely to engage in LBOs after increases in corporate income tax rates. Specifically, the increase in the likelihood of firms undertaking LBOs following tax increases is between 6.9% and 12.9%. We also find that this positive relation is more pronounced for firms with higher levels of return on assets (ROA) and marginal tax rates (MTR). Finally, we report that the mean value of tax benefits accounts for between 28.5% and 170% of the premium paid to pre-buyout shareholders.

This chapter provides strong evidence that tax benefits constitute an important source of value creation in LBOs and adds to the debate regarding the role of tax benefits in LBOs.