Chapter 11. Structures of multinational organisations

• Variety of organizations’ ownership forms
• Networks of organizations and corporate headquarters
• Differences in structures of international corporate networks
• Start-ups in global business
• Organizational structures of international companies
• Questions for chapter review
• Chapter bibliography

This chapter gives the reader a look at the organizational structures of businesses in different countries. At the beginning, the variety of forms of ownership of companies, the variety of legal forms of companies in different countries are described. Although the basic principles of ownership forms, separation of liability of the owner from the organization and legal forms remain very similar in many countries, the differences are revealed in certain details. The chapter introduces the reader to the concept of a network of international companies. In fact, it is not correct to say that there is a multinational company, because often it is not one, but a whole network of related companies that operate under the same name and brand in different countries. Network structures of international companies are also not the same, they differ in various cultural clusters (Inkpen & Ramaswamy, 2005). Even state regulation of transactions between related companies is different in various counties. Certain cooperative relationships between related companies provide a strong competitive advantage in some cultural clusters but are considered a law infringements in other cultural clusters.

Due to the growing importance of innovation in global business, more importance is being given to startups, their development ecosystems, and financing models. The chapter describes the technological readiness levels of innovations and the life cycles of start-ups, which in most cases end with the start-ups being acquired by international companies, or becoming international companies themselves, if only the innovation has proven itself and received the necessary funding for global large-scale production and distribution.

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