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Examines the impact of client industry on the use and effectiveness of audit analytical procedures. Segregates audit client firms into two industry categories ‐ new and matured. Posits that the industry category the client firm is operating in will have a substantial effect on the extensiveness, types and effectiveness of analytical procedures employed. In particular, hypothesizes that analytical procedures will be more extensively and effectively used in the audit of firms in matured industries. Further, hypothesizes that trend analysis will be used primarily in the audit of firms in matured industries while visual scanning of data and ratio analyses will be used in the audit of firms in both new and matured industries. The results of a questionnaire survey distributed to one of the Big Six audit firms in Singapore support the above hypotheses.

Many companies are placing greater emphasis today on the marketing of their mature brands. Notes several reasons for that trend persisting well into the future. Little has been written about how companies can more methodically plan and enact marketing strategies for these brands. Addresses the marketing of mature brands by: (1) providing a guide to the key (and sometimes misunderstood) terms involved with branding decisions; (2) describing a continuum comprised of ten strategic alternatives available to firms with mature brands; and (3) presenting recommendations as to when best to apply the various strategic alternatives.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between firms’ life cycle stages (mature vs growth) and green process innovation performance. In addition, this research delineates the mechanism by which the mature stage firms are more strongly associated with green process innovation performance compared to growth stage firms and recognizes technological capabilities as a mediating variable fundamental to achieve a higher level of green process innovation performance.

This research collected data from 202 publicly listed Thai manufacturing firms. Initially, it used multiple regression analysis to test the relationship between mature stage firms and green process innovation performance compared to the relationship between growth stage firms and green process innovation performance. Later, this research followed Muller et al. (2005) to test the mediating role of technological capabilities and conducted (Sobel, 1982, 1986; Preacher and Hayes, 2004) tests to further validate the mediation effect.

The hypothesized relationships were found to be significant, providing a strong support that mature stage firms have higher green process innovation performance compared with growth stage firms. Moreover, the technological capabilities more strongly mediate the relationship between mature stage firms and green process innovation performance compared to growth stage firms and green process innovation performance.

This research contributes to the existing understanding about the internal drivers of green process innovation performance by incorporating and analyzing the firms’ life cycle stages as an internal driver. This research also contributes by empirically testing the mediating role of technological capabilities on the relationship between firms’ life cycle stages and green process innovation performance.

The purpose of this study is to explain the adjustment rate made to target capital structures by listed non-financial firms in Pakistan during the courses of their life cycles and to determine what factors influence their adjustment rates.

The study used multivariate analysis to classify 39 years (1972-2010) of unbalanced panel data from listed non-financial Pakistani firms in terms of their growth, maturity and decline stages. Further, it used a fixed-effects panel data model to determine the factors that influence capital structure and adjustment rates during the life-cycle stages of firms.

The study observed a low–high–low leverage pattern during the growth, maturity and decline stages of businesses in line with tradeoff theory. Furthermore, the study observed an adjustment rate for growing firms of between 49.3-37.9 per cent, for mature firms of between 35.5-17.5 per cent and for declining firms of between 22.2-15.1 per cent toward their respective leverage targets. Furthermore, it was found that growing firms have higher leverage adjustment rates because, by having more investment opportunities, these firms can alter their capital structures easily by changing the composition of their new issues.

Erratic economic conditions in Pakistan have created an uncertain business environment. Therefore, even mature Pakistani firms remain skeptical about the sustainability of positive trends among current economic indicators. Furthermore, to avoid uncertainty, Pakistani firms grab short-term opportunities by using quickly available short-term debt as a main financing source. Government should introduce long-term policies that will stabilize the business environment and strengthen the financial, as well as the judicial, institutions of the country so that these firms may benefit from long-term investment opportunities and access more options for raising external financing. The results of this study will also help policymakers for other Asian economies where the capital markets are underdeveloped and where firms have higher leverage ratios, such as Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia.

This is the first study in Pakistan that has used a multivariate approach to classify firms into their different life-cycle stages and to discover the leverage adjustment rates of firms during those life-cycle stages.

This study aims to investigate how mature born global firms create value for customers to achieve continued international growth.

The study employs a case study approach to investigate the under-researched area of how mature born globals create value for customers and, by doing so, contribute to their continued international growth. This in-depth examination of how three born globals developed over time uses interviews, observation and secondary data.

The findings indicate that the entrepreneurs of born global firms, that continued to grow, created a culture in the early stages that supported value creation for foreign customers. These firms have built a competitive position by developing international niche products. They have also implemented a combination of proactive and reactive market orientation to facilitate the creation and delivery of value to customers. To maintain growth, they further invest the revenues earned on additional international marketing activities and continuously enhance their focal products.

The study relies on three cases. We therefore recommend that future studies extend the scope of the research to several companies in various industries and countries, in which the theoretical arguments can be applied. In addition, further studies that test the propositions developed in this study, in different contexts, are highly recommended.

To gain international growth, managers should create an organizational culture that facilitates satisfying international customer needs. Firms should continuously invest in sales and market development (e.g. social media marketing, personal selling) and undertake technology development of niche rather than new products. To achieve international growth, managers need to standardize part of the offer to achieve economies of scale and adapt the other part to international customers' needs.

Research on born globals has focused on the early stages of their internationalization processes, while largely neglecting the later stages (mature born globals) or the factors that lead to continued international growth. To address this gap, this study explores what happens when born globals ‘grow up’. This study contributes to the literature by capturing the factors and processes underlying how mature born globals create value for customers, for international growth. In particular, the study shows that the culture and strategies developed in the born globals' early stages also lead to international growth in later stages. The mature born globals have also invested in niche products, brand building, and effective market channels and adopted a combination of proactive and reactive market orientations.

The purpose of this paper is to assess US-based firms from 2005 to 2015 to determine whether firms with better corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance will allocate capital through their life-cycle to better maintain or extend total assets.

Kinder, Lydenberg, Domini Research & Analytics social performance rating scores were used to measure CSR performance in an initial sample of 19,707 firm-year observations. Firms are first classified into stages including introduction, growth, maturity, and decline, and use multiclass linear discriminant analysis, the Dickinson classification scheme (Dickinson, 2011), and the ratio of retained earnings to total assets (RETA) as life-cycle proxies. Life-cycle was formulated based on a broad set of accounting data sourced from Compustat. Various corporate characteristics from the CRSP database were used to classify all sample firms into five equal groups based on their CSR performance.

A firm’s equity and debt issuance assume a hump shape over the life-cycle under CSR practice, and higher-CSR firms face fewer significant issues as they mature; payout, RETA, and free cash flow decreased from high-CSR performance firms to low-CSR performance firms; and cash holdings also exhibit a hump shape over the life-cycle and higher-CSR practices are associated with significantly lower cash holdings.

CSR performance is a useful predictor for forecasting firm life-cycle and superior CSR performance ensures efficient capital allocation throughout firm life-cycle. Furthermore, CSR practice is an indicator of firm life-cycle sustainability and indicates a firm’s future cash flow patterns.

This paper aims to investigate the impact of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) adoption on financial reporting quality and cost of equity. The paper further investigates whether such association varies at different life cycle stages.

This paper follows the methodologies of DeAngelo et al. (2006) and Dickinson (2011) to develop proxies for the firms’ stages in the life cycle.

Using both pre- and post-IFRS adoption period for Australian listed companies, the paper finds that financial reporting quality reduced and cost of equity increased because of the adoption of IFRS. The paper further evidences that financial reporting quality in the post-IFRS period increased cost of equity. Finally, the paper finds that mature firms produce a better quality of earnings, which result in lower cost of capital. The results indicate that a mature firm was benefited because of the adoption of IFRS.

The finding of this research is useful to the regulators and practitioners to understand the widespread benefit of IFRS adoption.

This study empirically investigates the role of product market competition and mature-stage firm life cycle on the relation between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and market performance in an emerging market context – Malaysia.

The authors construct a comprehensive CSR index toward the economy, environment and society (EES) and apply both Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) and Two-Stage Least Squares (2SLS) instrumental variables (IV) approaches to test the hypotheses of the study.

The authors find that EES-based CSR generally enhances firms' market performance; however, the level of product market competition undermines the market performance of socially and economically responsible firms. In addition, the study results indicate that mature-stage firm life cycle with more involvement in CSR activities shows better market performance. However, the endogeneity check of CSR suggests that both CSR and mature-stage firms are mutually exclusive in influencing market performance. The study findings are robust to alternative measures and different identifications of high and low default risk situations of sample firms.

This study carries practical policy implications for the listed firms, regulators and stakeholders in general. For example, regulatory bodies may promote greater involvement in CSR activities by listed companies in the Malaysian stock market. Investors and other market participants should be aware of factors influencing socially responsible firms' market performance such as the corporate life cycle and the level of competition in product markets.

This research work responds to the call of regulatory bodies in Malaysia at a time when the Malaysian economy is under threat of environmental distraction practices by the palm oil industry and import ban by the largest export market, i.e. the European Union by 2030. The study also contributes to the theoretical literature by refining the moderating role of product market competition and mature-stage life cycle on the relationship between CSR and market performance from the perspectives of resource-based and stakeholder theories in emerging economy settings.

This paper aims to offer a research-based assessment of why mature firms in mature industries may struggle to survive. The basic issues explored are major hurdles to the dynamic path that the contingency theory would predict.

By examining dozens of studies through the lens of organizational and industry life cycle theory, the authors investigate how organizational maturity itself thwarts better choices.

Environmental shifts in the marketplace, rigid policies, lengthy procedures and internally focused politics often hinder change.

Limited to examining the work of others, this paper, nevertheless, offers an approach to using the life cycle theory for new insights.

The results provide practitioners with a roadmap. The authors advise them to prepare early for the maturity stage, possibly bring in external talent, evaluate potential mergers or partnerships and consider building the R&D budget.

Firm failure brings dislocation to a wide array of stakeholders. This paper emphasizes viable growth strategies, given the constraints firms face in maturity.

This paper deals with survival, integrating both environmental and organizational obstacles. This unique approach offers practitioners a synthesized view of the challenges they face in a mature stage and simultaneously suggests methods for change.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between dividend policy and the life cycle of firms in India. In addition, this study intends to examine the variation in dividend behaviour over the life cycle of a firm. The study anticipates that a firm's dividend behaviour varies over its life cycle.

To scrutinize the validity of the proposition, the authors classify 1968 non-financial industrial firms listed at Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) into growth, mature and stagnant firms over the period 2000–20. Additionally, to check the robustness of the results, they use an array of techniques such as analysis of variance, pooled ordinary least squares, fixed effects models and random effects models.

The empirical findings suggest that dividend behaviour varies over a firm's life cycle. Specifically, stagnant firms are paying significantly higher dividends than growth firms. Mature firms are paying significantly higher dividends than growth firms. The results are consistent after controlling the effects of firm's size, profitability, leverage, operating risk, systematic risk and growth opportunities.

The findings are useful for corporate decision makers in establishing an appropriate dividend policy conditional on firms' life cycle stage and for shareholders in making investment decisions.

The relation between dividend policy and firm life cycle has not been examined before in the context of Indian stock market. Thus, this research bridges this gap in the literature.