Corporate Diversity and Ownership Structure throughout Company Life Cycle

Abstract

Objective: Regarding the theory of life cycle, companies in different stages of their life cycle have financial and economic indicators and certain behaviors. That is, the financial and economic characteristics of a company are influenced by the stage of life cycle of the company. Considering this, this study aimed at assessing the effectiveness of company ownership and the diversity of the company in company's life cycle. Methods: The sample consists of 127 companies accepted in the Tehran Stock Exchange in the period 2011-2016. In this study, to test the hypotheses, the analysis of variance was examined, and to compare the mean of variables, the LSD test and SPSS software were used. Results: Research findings showed there are significantly differences among ownership structures in the different stages of company's life cycle. That is, the differences among the structure of ownership in the company's growth phase are more marked by maturity and decline. Also, the results showed the diversity of activities of the company at the maturity stage is more varied than at the stage of growth and decline. Conclusion: The findings indicated companies at the maturity stage are considered with special interests by the public and government, and are controlled by institutional stockholders. Also, these companies have more diversification because of their higher stability.

Keywords

• company life cycle
• corporate ownership
• corporate diversity
• lsd test