Doctoral Dissertation Research, Diversification, Mergers, and Acquisitions in the Telecommunication Market, 1990-2002

这项研究将探索在寻求通过收购实现增长的竞争性公司领域中，潜在市场价值是如何构建的。我将使用一个新的制度框架来研究在1996年放松管制后，竞争、监督和模仿如何导致电信和媒体市场细分市场的价值构建。我会问并试图回答两个问题：1)模仿对特定细分市场的收购有什么影响，2)收购是否会导致以聚合同行模仿为特征的细分市场中的公司估值过高？这些问题特别适用于1996年后电信和媒体市场，当时电信和媒体市场经历了大幅度的放松管制，新技术的出现有可能取代现有公司和市场。我将收集这段时间内电信和媒体领域上市公司收购的数据(使用合并和收购出版物)，然后将其与Compustat和CRSP数据库中的财务数据结合起来。我还将收集有关技术创新(从美国专利网站)和公司联锁的更多数据。使用二元体作为分析单位，我将首先确定竞争和同行模仿(以及它们的相互作用)在多大程度上影响竞标公司收购目标。在第二个分析中，我将确定同行模仿在多大程度上对收购公司的股东价值(或超额价值)产生积极影响。最后，我将讨论电信和媒体公司之间的同行模仿可能是如何促成了“市场泡沫”的产生，当收入和生产率没有达到预期水平时，“市场泡沫”最终破裂。这一研究将有助于我们对市场价值构建的理解。虽然早期的研究侧重于外部规范和制度如何影响定价，但在我的论文中，我将把市场价值概念化，认为它是从市场本身的竞争动态中产生的，尽管不是以经济学家通常设想的方式。竞争不会导致价格集中在某种“真实”的需求水平上，实际上可能会导致企业夸大产品和服务的潜在价值。这项研究的更广泛的影响是双重的：这种对价值创造的社会学理解将使政策制定者和学者对市场过程以及竞争加剧和放松管制对创新产业的影响有更多的实证理解。这些发现将有助于对市场行为采取跨学科的方法，并将提供放松管制后企业行为的证据，可用于未来的政策辩论。

This study will explore how potential market value is constructed in a field of competitive firms seeking to grow using acquisitions. I will use a neoinstitutional framework to examine how competition, monitoring, and mimicry leads to the construction of value in telecommunications and media market segments following the 1996 deregulation. I will ask and attempt to provide answers to two questions: 1) what is the effect of mimicry on acquisitions into specific market segments, and 2) did acquisitions contribute to overvaluation of firms in market segments characterized by aggregated peer mimicry? These questions are of particular interest when applied to the telecommunications and media market segments in the post-1996 era when those markets experienced significant deregulation and new technologies emerged that threatened to displace incumbent firms and market segments. I will collect data on acquisitions among publicly traded corporations in the telecommunications and media segments during this time span (using the Mergers and Acquisitions publication) and then combine it with financial data from the COMPUSTAT and CRSP databases. I will also collect additional data on technological innovation (from the U.S. patent website) and corporate interlocks. Using the dyad as the unit of analysis I will, first, determine to what extent competition and peer mimicry (and their interaction) affect the acquisition of a target by a bidding firm. In a second analysis, I will determine to what extent peer mimicry positively affects the shareholder value (or excess value) of acquiring firms. Finally, I will discuss how peer mimicry among telecommunications and media firms may have contributed to the creation of a "market bubble," which eventually imploded when revenues and productivity did not meet expected levels. This study will contribute to our understanding of the construction of market value. While earlier studies have focused on how external norms and institutions affect pricing, in my dissertation I will conceptualize market value as emerging from the competitive dynamics of the market itself, although not in the ways typically conceived by economists. Competition, rather than causing prices to center on some "true" level of demand, may actually cause firms to inflate the potential value of products and services. The broader impacts of this study are twofold: This sociological understanding of value creation will provide policymakers and scholars with a more empirical understanding of market processes and of the effect of increased competition and deregulation on innovative industries. These findings will contribute to an interdisciplinary approach to market behavior and will provide evidence of firm behavior following deregulation that can be used in future policy debates.