Successful management buyouts: Are they really more entrepreneurial?

The paper explores the impact of entrepreneurial management dimensions on post-MBO financial performance. We use Stevenson’s conceptualization of entrepreneurship (1983), empirically validated by Brown, Davidsson and Wiklund (2001), positing that entrepreneurial companies will be involved in recognizing and exploiting opportunity, regardless of the resources controlled. From the literature we hypothesize positive effects of entrepreneurial management dimensions on post-MBO financial performance. We find that successful buyout managers cannot be classified as entrepreneurs on all entrepreneurial dimensions. Instead they ambidextrously combine the pursuit of valuable opportunities with the exploitation and control of their resources. Implications for theory and managerial practice are discussed.