Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the current state of literature concerning mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in family businesses and to highlight areas for future research. Design/methodology/approach This literature review systematically analyses the findings of 41 journal articles on M&A in family businesses, identifying key thematic categories according to the main topics of the studies. Findings This study finds that it is important to distinguish and examine the type of governance, such as family and non-family, when studying M&A issues, because their distinctive features influence their strategic choices, business goals, and, thus, M&A behavior. Three topic areas are identified in existing research: M&A propensity, process, and performance. Furthermore, methodological and definitional issues regarding the findings are discussed. Research limitations/implications The findings imply that owing to their idiosyncratic nature, the use of alternative theoretical frameworks in addition to agency theory is encouraged in future studies in order to better capture the nature of family businesses. In general, further research on M&A issues in family business settings is needed, especially in the pre-merger phase, which is crucial to M&A performance. Social implications Overlooking particular issues that may arise in the context of transactions involving family businesses may lead to problems in M&A processes. Recognizing the importance of these issues in such transactions has important value for practitioners supporting family businesses in M&A processes. Originality/value This study takes the first step in analyzing the literature on M&A in family businesses, establishing linkages between family business, corporate governance, and financial management literature, and structuring the existing research to highlight opportunities with relevance for both theory and practice.

No abstract

No one informed the dinosaurs that their thermal insulation could someday be useful for another purpose, yet their feathers developed into wings. This example describes exaptation, the discovery of new uses for existing traits; complementary to adaptation. The former, which is similar to opportunity recognition, and the latter, which follows environmental demands, are paths of knowledge utilization. Following the notion of exaptive repurposing of knowledge in internationalization, this study illustrates how internationalizing emerging markets changes a firm's behavior from adaptive to exaptive, offering a systematic theory to analyze organizational behavior in a variety of contexts. This study illustrates how a change from developed to emerging locations demands new uses for existing knowledge. This expansion creates further possibilities for additional expansions to developing economies in a similar state. This is particularly important since it illustrates how organizations from developed markets adopt a behavior more similar to ones originating from emerging markets, such as the capability to deal with political instability. However, this process can take a significantly long time. Therefore, we suggest exaptation is an essential concept in understanding organizational learning patterns in emerging markets and that capabilities learned in emerging economies can further leverage organizational capabilities in other emerging locations.