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This study aims to fill this research gap by providing a comprehensive exploration of the transnationalization of higher education in China and Asia, with a particular focus on how institutions maintain quality assurance and how student learning experiences are reported.

The transnationalization of higher education involves educational programs and services provided by institutions or universities in a country other than their home country where students from diverse countries are trained. The goal of transnational education is to offer higher education to students who face obstacles in physically entering the host country of a transnational program, encourage globalization, enhance cross-cultural communication and improve the quality of education by expanding students' learning opportunities, providing diverse educational experiences and elevating academic standards. The transnationalization of higher education has become a crucial endeavor in Asia, especially in countries such as China, Malaysia and Singapore, where rapid economic development and globalization have prompted the need to evolve into knowledge-driven economies to meet the increasing demand for higher education. The factors driving the expansion of transnational higher education in China and Asia include the desire for top-quality education, the allure of international students, the establishment of worldwide collaborations and aspirations to be recognized as centers of academic distinction. The rapid expansion and increasing importance of transnational higher education has underscored the vital role of quality assurance. To guarantee educational quality, maintain institutional reputation and improve overall student outcomes, several agencies and frameworks have been established to uphold international standards.

Based upon extensive literature reveiw and case analysis, our findings indicated the quality assurance assessment varies and is primarily influenced by host countries and provider polices. However, students in transnational higher education programs report satisfaction with their experienes and the quality of their programs, which tends to meet their expecations.

This study presents the first comprehsensive literatrue rewiew and case analysis of how transnational higher education in China, Sinapore, Malaysia and Vietnam uphold quality assurance and report students learning experiences. Additionally, the findings highlight why future researceh on this topic is crucial and why forestering colloboration among countries in Asian regions is imporant in term of growing geo-politics.

Effective refractive error (RE) coverage in a resource-constrained country such as Kenya could possibly be achievable if the current dominant commercial entrepreneurship is supplemented with alternative avenues such as social entrepreneurship. This study aims to explore the perceived impact of social enterprises (SEs) in scaling effective RE coverage in Kenya.

This was an exploratory study with data collected from representatives of SEs (n = 29), trainees of SEs (n = 112) and beneficiaries of eye care services provided by SEs (n = 674). Participants were recruited purposively with data collected through telephonic calls. Thematic analysis was carried out by categorizing the codes into categories and themes based on the semantic meaning of the codes.

The perceived impact of SEs from the representative perspective included entrepreneurship and livelihood (n = 3; 10.3%), skills development (n = 20; 69%), technology development (n = 7; 24.1%), access to specialized services (n = 7; 24.1%) and affordability, accessibility and availability of RE services (n = 27; 93.1%). From the perspective of trainees, the themes included economic empowerment (n = 99; 88.4%), improved quality of life (n = 84; 75.0%), sensitizing locals to RE during screening events (n = 112; 100.0%) and enhancing accessibility, availability and affordability (n = 107; 95.5%).

The perceived impact of SEs highlighted in this paper showcases that they are useful for integration into the eye health ecosystem in a resource-constrained country such as Kenya. Integration of SEs into the eye health ecosystem could potentially address the human resource challenge, scale RE service delivery, enhance awareness creation and address the cost barriers to current RE service delivery coverage.

This case study would enable students to understand the concept, process and advantages of mergers and acquisitions as a growth strategy with respect to 1mg. Also, the students would be able to use the threats, opportunities, weaknesses and strengths matrix to map 1mg’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

This case study analyses the transformation journey of 1mg to Tata 1mg, one of the most trusted internet pharmacies in India. This case describes a small start-up that was launched in 2013 and had made many acquisitions since then. This case revolves around Tata Digital’s purchase of 1mg. The case starts out by explaining 1mg’s financial situation and why the company was acquired. This case study focuses on how the integration helped Tata Digital and 1mg realize their respective missions. Furthermore, the case study illustrates the benefits and difficulties of this integration.

This case study is basically aimed at postgraduate management students; it can be used in strategic management and health-care courses. Students can understand the concept of diversification and acquisition with the help of this case study. Students can also gain an insight into the organic and inorganic diversification as a growth strategy.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 11: Strategy.

Although previous research has examined the role of franchising for the economic development of countries, no empirical study to date has investigated the importance of franchising for social, infrastructural, and institutional development. The authors address this research gap by applying research results from the field of sustainable entrepreneurship and highlight that franchising has a positive impact on economic, social, institutional and infrastructural development.

This study uses a fixed-effects model on a panel dataset for 2006–2015 from 49 countries to test the hypothesis that franchising positively influences various dimensions of country development such as economic social institutional and infrastructural development.

The findings highlight that franchising has a positive impact on the economic, social, infrastructural, and institutional development of a country. Specifically, the results show that the earlier and the more franchising systems enter a country, the stronger the positive impact of franchising on the country's economic, social, institutional, and infrastructural development.

This study has several limitations that provide directions for further research. First, the empirical investigation is limited by the characteristics of the data, which are composed of information from 49 countries (covering a period of 10 years). Because franchising is not recognized as a form of entrepreneurial governance in many emerging and developing countries, the available information is mainly provided by the franchise associations in the various countries. Hence, there is a need to collect additional data in each country and to include additional countries. Second, although the authors included developed and developing countries in the analysis, the authors could not differentiate between developed and developing countries when testing the hypotheses, because the database was not sufficiently complete. Third, future studies should analyze the causality issue between franchising and development more closely. The role of franchising in development may be changing depending on different unobserved country factors, economic sector characteristics, or development stages.

What are the practical implications of this study for the role of franchising in the development of emerging and developing economies? Because public policy in emerging and developing countries suffers from a lack of financial resources to improve the social, infrastructural and institutional environment, entrepreneurs, such as franchisors who expand into these countries, play an important role for these countries' development. In addition to their entrepreneurial role of exploring and exploiting profit opportunities, they are social, institutional, and political entrepreneurs who may positively influence country development (Schaltegger and Wagner, 2011; Shepard and Patzelt, 2011). Specifically, the findings highlight that countries with an older franchise sector (more years of franchise experience) may realize first-mover advantages and hence larger positive spillover effects on their economic, social, institutional and infrastructural development than countries with a younger franchise sector. Hence, governments of emerging and developing countries have the opportunity and responsibility to reduce potential market entry barriers and provide additional incentives for franchise systems in order to trigger these positive spillover effects. The authors expect that the spillover effects from the franchise sector on the economic, institutional, social and infrastructural development of a country are stronger in emerging and developing countries than in developed countries.

Previous research has focused on the impact of franchising on the economic development of a country, such as its growth of gross domestic product (GDP), employment, business skills, innovation and technology transfer. This study extends the existing literature by going beyond the impact of franchising on economic development: the results show that franchising as an entrepreneurial activity offers opportunities for economic, social, institutional, and infrastructural development, all of which are particularly important for emerging and developing economies. The findings of this study contribute to the international franchise and development economics literature by offering a better understanding of the impact of franchising on country development.

Social franchise chains have social goals rather than – or in addition to – commercial or profit-making goals. But are these social goals, disclosed by social franchisors, aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and, if so, which ones?

The authors examine the disclosure of SDG-related information on websites of 69 social franchise chains operating in Africa.

The authors' main findings show that social goals disclosed by social franchisors are aligned with certain SDGs that are general in nature and not just sector-dependent, except in the case of education.

The authors' paper contributes to the practice by providing examples of the types and varieties of social goals social franchisors can pursue. Moreover, entrepreneurs might be encouraged to launch their franchise concept as franchisors who contribute to SDGs at an international, national or regional level or to join franchise chains as franchisees who contribute to SDGs at the local level.

The authors' findings show the potential for social franchise chains in developing countries to target and contribute to achieving SDGs.

The authors' paper adds to the limited literature on SDGs and, more specifically, on the role of the private sector, in particular social franchisors, in targeting and achieving SDGs.

Despite the significance of knowledge sharing for competitive advantage in networked businesses like franchising systems, there is a lack of comprehensive understanding regarding the strategic value of knowledge sharing in the context of franchising. In particular, the specific contribution of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in facilitating interorganizational knowledge exchange among franchising members remains inadequately understood, particularly in emerging economies. Therefore, this study aims to explore the mechanisms involved in the knowledge-sharing process facilitated by a virtual learning environment (VLE) within franchising networks and examine the role of VLEs in facilitating knowledge.

This study uses a multiple-case study approach involving 24 franchisees and the franchisor within a Brazilian franchising network operating in the furniture market to examine the role played by a VLE.

The results of the study reveal that the introduction of a VLE has played a significant role in fostering enhancements in the knowledge-sharing process among the franchisor and franchisees in the network. Moreover, the results indicate that VLEs play a significant role in overcoming geographical obstacles, thereby enabling efficient knowledge sharing between franchisees and franchisors operating in extensive territorial contexts. Finally, findings indicate that intracommercial competition acts as a prominent barrier, leading to low levels of cooperation and knowledge-sharing intent among franchisees within the network.

This study contributes to the existing knowledge by enhancing the understanding of how ICTs can facilitate knowledge sharing in organizations operating within franchising systems. Furthermore, this paper advances the comprehension of the role of networking franchising configuration and governance in supporting organizational improvements. Additional actionable insights are provided.

The purpose of this study is to examine whether variation in franchising across US states can be explained by differences in state regulatory burdens.

Three years of US state-level panel data is used on measures of franchising activity published by the International Franchise Association. The authors measured variation in regulatory burdens across state governments using the regulatory freedom index, developed by the Cato Institute. Multiple regression analysis was the statistical technique used.

Controlling for state-level per capita personal income, educational attainment, unemployment and share of population identifying as non-white, the authors find states with fewer regulatory burdens for business owners have more franchises and franchise jobs per 100,000 residents, higher franchise output per capita and a larger share of small businesses are franchises. These results were robust to alternative econometric specifications. The results support our hypothesis that states with lower regulatory burdens will have more franchising activity.

Only three years of data are currently available; however, our research provides some practical avenues for managers and policy makers to explore when considering new franchise opportunities or developing policies that impact regulatory burdens for small businesses.

This study contributes to the literature by providing supporting evidence for the relationship between US state institutional factors and franchised small businesses, and it adds a cross-state study to the existing literature using cross-country and cross-city data.

This study aims to provides the insights on the advantages and disadvantages of international franchising and licensing from the perspectives of legal and business considerations in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

Using a quantitative research approach, the authors conducted a survey with 150 business owners and franchisees in the GCC and analyzed the data using descriptive statistics, structural equation modeling and frequency analysis.

The findings reveal that while international franchising and licensing offer significant benefits for business expansion and revenue growth, they also pose risks related to legal compliance, cultural differences and intellectual property protection. Indeed, the results of this study provide valuable insights into the advantages and disadvantages of international franchising and licensing in the GCC from both legal and business perspectives.

There is limited research on the legal and business perspectives of international franchising and licensing in the GCC. This study contributes to the literature by providing a comprehensive analysis of the legal and business perspectives of international franchising and licensing in the GCC.

The Indian power distribution companies are increasingly recognizing franchising for reviving their high loss-making rural pockets. The motivation for franchising has been a reduction of the franchisor's resource scarcity by bringing in operational efficiency and improved service quality to end consumers. However, there is a dearth of evidence on the influence of the franchisee's operations in addressing the resource scarcity of franchisors in predominantly rural areas. This study contributes towards filling the research gap.

A qualitative embedded multiple case study was conducted. The cases comprised two rural franchisees operating towards attaining the common goal. The study was built on archival analysis, personal observations and semi-structured interviews with the franchisors and franchisee officials across the organization's hierarchical levels. A conceptual model based on the review of prior literature formed the initial set of coding for the study. The data were presented based on within-case and across-case analysis.

The analysis revealed that the contract design impacts the requisite operational efficiency achievement. This variation could be elaborated by factors, such as system adaptation across organizational hierarchy, autonomy and independence, review and feedback systems, monitoring, a professional's attitude, bureaucracy, adaption with the local areas, risk sharing, incentives and compensation structure.

The study findings could be generalized to the extent of similar socio-economic conditions, prevailing governance mechanisms and law and orders. Additionally, since the law does not mandate the regulatory commissions to scrutinize the performance of the franchisees, the study was built on data shared by the franchisees and the discom. Further, this study considered the performance of only two performing franchisees. Matching these actualities with the discoveries of this study remains a continuing project as participation of private players is increasingly being recognized. Therefore, the insights drawn from this study could be used to improve the franchise model and can be scaled up across the nation, regions and sectors.

There is a dearth of literature on franchising in electricity distribution. This study is one of the first studies on studying the franchise system in the electricity distribution sector through the application of a well-accepted management theory.

Education to an international standard that can provide successful careers has arguably been the main drive of many parents to allocate scarce financial resources to the education of their progenies. Competition for high-calibre degrees has seen an explosion of opportunity in the private education sector. As many Global South countries do not have the equivalent control of standards provided in the United Kingdom (UK) by the Quality Assurance Agency, this can lead to dissatisfaction with the qualifications received in the Global South. This chapter aims to explore the factors influencing participation in higher education in the Global North versus the Global South, particularly where these relate to or vary by locality, and the relative influence these have on the propensity of the learners living in these areas to progress into higher education in local universities. The conceptual framework and methodology provided in this chapter show the differences between transnational education (TNE) as primarily a standalone or independent activity supported by a UK higher education institution (HEI)/provider versus being a collaborative effort between a UK host university and a South/Southeast Asian HEI university partner. The methodology provides a strategy for UK host institutions to best provide carefully aligned independent or collaborative partnerships with the partner country regulatory bodies. The chapter concludes with the author’s personal reflections and recommendations based on decades of collaborative and independent university provision of TNE. These reflections are focused on design-based courses in selected South/Southeast Asian HEI partnerships with the College of Architecture and Design at Birmingham City University.