Santiago Gutiérrez-Broncano, Jorge Linuesa-Langreo, Mercedes Rubio-Andrés and Miguel Ángel Sastre-Castillo
This article focusses on the hybrid strategy, a simultaneous combination of cost leadership and differentiation strategy. The study aims to examine the impact of hybrid strategy…
Abstract
Purpose
This article focusses on the hybrid strategy, a simultaneous combination of cost leadership and differentiation strategy. The study aims to examine the impact of hybrid strategy on firm performance through its anticipated positive effects on process and product innovation. In addition, we study the moderating role of adaptive capacity in the direct relationships of hybrid strategy with process and product innovation.
Design/methodology/approach
Structural equation modelling was used to analyse 1,842 Spanish firms with fewer than 250 employees. We randomly selected small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) operating in Spain from the Spanish Central Business Directory (2021) database. The overall sample design was based on stratified sampling.
Findings
We found that hybrid strategy is positively related to firm performance and to process and product innovation. Additionally, in firms implementing hybrid strategies, process innovation fostered firm performance. Finally, adaptive capacity strengthened the relationships of hybrid strategy with process and product innovation. This sheds light on how and when hybrid strategy is most effective in fostering SME performance.
Practical implications
We highlight that SMEs need to establish strategies that use diverse resources and capabilities and not just generate competitive advantage using one strategy (cost leadership or differentiation strategy). This requires an agile and flexible systems and structures.
Originality/value
Our research provides novel results by proposing the adoption of hybrid strategies instead of pure strategies (cost leadership and differentiation strategy) as a way for SMEs to survive during crises. Unlike “stuck in the middle” strategies, our study demonstrates the importance of hybrid strategies in a comprehensive model that links them to innovation and firm performance, with adaptive capacity being a determining factor.
Details
Keywords
Lianet Farfán-Pérez, Jorge O. Moreno and María de las Mercedes Adamuz
This paper studies the determinants of the debt maturity of Mexican-listed companies by analysing the effects on the extensive (issuing or liquidating debt) and the intensive…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper studies the determinants of the debt maturity of Mexican-listed companies by analysing the effects on the extensive (issuing or liquidating debt) and the intensive (debt maturity renegotiation) margins.
Design/methodology/approach
This study, using a Tobit model for panel data and measuring maturity as a time variable, shows that size, liquidity and leverage, among other firm characteristics, as well as the market interest rate, explain debt maturity. Additionally, the study employs the McDonald and Moffitt decomposition to determine whether the explanatory variables of maturity have a more significant effect on the decision to issue or liquidate debt or on debt maturity renegotiations.
Findings
The results obtained highlight that the market interest rate negatively affects debt maturity. On the other hand, variables like size, liquidity, collateral and leverage demonstrate a positive relationship with the dependent variable. In addition, the extensive margin has a higher impact on corporate debt than the intensive margin, suggesting that firms prefer to liquidate or issue new debt rather than renegotiate preexisting contracts.
Research limitations/implications
The main limitation of this study is the use of an unbalanced panel. The lack of data limits the application of specific methodologies suggested by the literature as a way to test the robustness of the estimates.
Originality/value
First of all, this study adds empirical evidence of debt maturity decisions by publicly traded firms in a middle-income country such as Mexico to the existing literature on maturity choice. Second, the study treats debt maturity as a time-censored, limited variable. Finally, the authors have used the McDonald and Moffitt (1980) methodology to decompose the effect of each independent variable into extensive and intensive margins.