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Corporate Strategy
Johnson, Whittington and Scholes, Exploring Strategy, 9th Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
Chapter Objectives
• Scope of Corporate Strategy
• Identify alternative strategy options

– market penetration, product development, market development and diversification
• Distinguish between different diversification strategies

– related and conglomerate diversification
– Evaluate diversification drivers
• Benefits of vertical integration and outsourcing
• Corporate parent
– Role of corporate parent
– Value addition, Value destruction
• Portfolio Analysis tools

– BCG Matric, Mckinsey GE Matrix
Key Terms
• Parenting Advantage:
– Value-adding effect of head office to individual SBUs of the
organization
• Synergy:
– Benefits gained where activities or assets complement each
other so that their combined effect is greater than the sum of
the parts
– Often referred to as the ‘2 + 2 = 5’ effect
Strategic directions and
corporate-level strategy
Corporate strategy
Diversification
• Diversification involves increasing the range of products

or markets served by an organisation.
– Related diversification involves diversifying into

products or services with relationships to the existing
business.
– Conglomerate (unrelated) diversification involves

diversifying into products or services with no
relationships to the existing businesses.
Market penetration
Market penetration refers to a strategy of increasing

share of current markets with the current product range.
This strategy:
Builds on established strategic capabilities
Organization scope ramains unchanged
Increased market power - with buyers and suppliers
Economies of scale - provides greater and experience

curve benefits.
Constraints of
market penetration
Retaliation
Legal
from
constraints
competitors
Economic
Constraints
(recession or
funding crisis)
Consolidation & retrenchment
• Consolidation refers to a strategy by which an organisation focuses

defensively on their current markets with current products.
• Retrenchment refers to a strategy of withdrawal from marginal

activities in order to concentrate on the most valuable segments and
products within their existing business.
Product development
Product development refers to a strategy by which an

organisation delivers modified or new products to existing
markets.
• This strategy :
involves varying degrees of related diversification (in
terms of products);
can be an expensive and high risk
may require new strategic capabilities
typically involves project management risks.
Market development
Market development refers to a strategy by which an organisation
offers existing products to new markets
This strategy involves varying degrees of related diversification (in

terms of markets) it;
may also entail some product development (e.g. new styling or
packaging);
can take the form of attracting new users (e.g. extending the use of
aluminium to the automobile industry);
can take the form of new geographies (e.g. extending the market
covered to new areas – international markets being the most
important);
must meet the critical success factors of the new market if it is to
succeed;
may require new strategic capabilities especially in marketing.
Conglomerate diversification
Conglomerate (or unrelated)

diversification takes the organisation
beyond both its existing markets and its
existing products and radically increases the
organisation’s scope.
Drivers for diversification
• Exploiting economies of scope – efficiency gains through

applying the organisation’s existing resources or competences
to new markets or services.
• Stretching corporate management competences.
• Exploiting superior internal processes.
• Increasing market power.

Value-destroying diversification drivers
Some drivers for diversification which may involve value

destruction (negative synergies):
Responding to market decline
Spreading risk
Managerial ambition.
Diversification and performance
Vertical integration
• Vertical integration describes entering activities where

the organisation is its own supplier or customer.
• Backward integration refers to development into

activities concerned with the inputs into the company’s
current business.
• Forward integration refers to development into activities

concerned with the outputs of a company’s current
business.
Diversification and integration options
Outsourcing
Outsourcing is the process by which activities previously

carried out internally are subcontracted to external
suppliers.
The decision to integrate or subcontract rests on the

balance between two distinct factors:
• Relative strategic capabilities:
Does the subcontractor have the potential to do the work
significantly better?
• Risk of opportunism:
Is the subcontractor likely to take advantage of the
relationship over time?
Value-adding activities
Coaching and
Envisioning
facilitating
Providing central
services and Intervening
resources
Corporate Strategy Value Add: Envisioning
– Provide a clear overall vision or strategic intent
– Provide stakeholders with a clear external image of

the organisation
– Provides discipline
• Prevent wandering into inappropriate activities or
taking on unnecessary costs
Corporate Strategy Value Add: Providing
central services and resources
– Provide capital for investment
• And other central services such as treasury, tax and human
resource advice
• These activities may give sufficient scale to be efficient and
can build up relevant expertise.
– Centralised purchases increases bargaining power for shared
inputs such as energy
• Helpful in brokering with external bodies, such as
government regulators, or other companies in negotiating
alliances
– Important role in managing expertise within the corporate
• transferring managers across business units
• creating shared knowledge management systems via
corporate intranets
Value-destroying activities
Adding management costs
Adding bureaucratic complexity
Obscuring financial performance

Corporate rationales
• The portfolio manager
• The synergy manager
• The parental developer

Portfolio Manager
• Operates as an active investor in a way that

shareholders in the stock market are either
too dispersed or too inexpert to be able to do.
• Blackstone, with $300bn in assets, owns companies in

energy, real estate, water treatment, camera manufacture,
banking, railway operation and seed development with
more than 616,000 employees around the world.
Synergy manager
• Corporate parent seeking to enhance value

for business units by managing synergies
across business units
• Apple
• Personal computers - digital hub of the new digital
lifestyle
• Guided managers across the iMac computer, iPod,
iPhone and iPad businesses to ensure seamless
connections between the fast-developing offerings
Parental Developer
• Employ own central capabilities to add value

to its businesses
• Example
• A large organization such as Samsung

may have a centralized R&D
Corporate rationales
Challenge of attaining synergy benefits
• Excessive costs
– Benefits need to outweigh costs
• Overcoming self-interest
– Business unit managers’ willingness to sacrifice time and
resources for common good
• Illusory synergies
– Claimed synergies often prove illusory
– Overestimate value business unit may hold for skills or resources
of corporate
Portfolio matrices
Growth/Share (BCG) Matrix
Directional Policy (GE-McKinsey) Matrix
Parenting Matrix
The growth share (or BCG) matrix
The growth share (or BCG) matrix (2)
• A star is a business unit which has a high market

share in a growing market.
• A question mark (or problem child) is a business

unit in a growing market, but it does not have a high
market share.
• A cash cow is a business unit that has a high

market share in a mature market.
• A dog is a business unit that has a low market share

in a static or declining market
The growth share (or BCG) matrix (3)
Problems with the BCG matrix:

definitional vagueness,
capital market assumptions,
motivation problems,
self-fulfilling prophecies and
possible links to other business units.
The directional policy (GE–McKinsey) matrix
• Positions business units according to
– (1) How attractive the relevant market is in which they are

operating (PESTEL or Five Forces)
– (2) competitive strength of the SBU in that market (Competitor

analysis – Strategy Canvas (CSFs)
The directional policy (GE–McKinsey) matrix
The directional policy
(GE–McKinsey) matrix (2)
The parenting matrix
The parenting matrix
1. Heartland business units - the parent understands these well

and can add value. The core of future strategy.
2. Ballast business units - the parent understands these well but
can do little for them. They could be just as successful as
independent companies.
If not divested, they should be spared corporate bureaucracy.
3. Value-trap business units are dangerous. There are attractive
opportunities to add value but the parent’s lack of feel will result
in more harm than good The parent needs new capabilities to
move value-trap businesses into the heartland. It is easier to
divest to another corporate parent which could add value.
4. Alien business units are misfits. They offer little opportunity to
add value and the parent does not understand them. Exit is the
best strategy.

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Corporate Strategy

• Identify alternative strategy options

• Distinguish between different diversification strategies

• Benefits of vertical integration and outsourcing

• Portfolio Analysis tools

• Diversification involves increasing the range of products

– Related diversification involves diversifying into

– Conglomerate (unrelated) diversification involves

Market penetration refers to a strategy of increasing

Builds on established strategic capabilities

Organization scope ramains unchanged

Increased market power - with buyers and suppliers

Economies of scale - provides greater and experience

• Consolidation refers to a strategy by which an organisation focuses

• Retrenchment refers to a strategy of withdrawal from marginal

Product development refers to a strategy by which an

This strategy involves varying degrees of related diversification (in

Conglomerate (or unrelated)

• Exploiting economies of scope – efficiency gains through

• Stretching corporate management competences.

• Exploiting superior internal processes.

• Increasing market power.

Some drivers for diversification which may involve value

Responding to market decline

• Vertical integration describes entering activities where

• Backward integration refers to development into

• Forward integration refers to development into activities

Outsourcing is the process by which activities previously

The decision to integrate or subcontract rests on the

– Provide a clear overall vision or strategic intent

– Provide stakeholders with a clear external image of

Adding management costs

Adding bureaucratic complexity

Obscuring financial performance

• The portfolio manager

• The synergy manager

• The parental developer

• Operates as an active investor in a way that

• Blackstone, with $300bn in assets, owns companies in

• Corporate parent seeking to enhance value

• Employ own central capabilities to add value

• A large organization such as Samsung

Growth/Share (BCG) Matrix

Directional Policy (GE-McKinsey) Matrix

• A star is a business unit which has a high market

• A question mark (or problem child) is a business

• A cash cow is a business unit that has a high

• A dog is a business unit that has a low market share

Problems with the BCG matrix:

• Positions business units according to

– (1) How attractive the relevant market is in which they are

– (2) competitive strength of the SBU in that market (Competitor

1. Heartland business units - the parent understands these well

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