ABSTRACT
We analyze the evolution of business groups as an organizational form and how this organizational form has played a role in the globalization of markets. Business groups, a collection of legally-independent firms operating in unrelated product markets and connected to each other via equity and other ties, exist in many countries and currently play a major role in emerging ones. In emerging economies, business groups have been the dominant forms of large enterprises and led the internationalization processes of their economies. The internationalization of the Koç group, the largest Turkish business group, illustrates how membership in a business group provides affiliated companies with not only advantages in their internationalization, but also disadvantages, and how the adoption of pro-market reforms has profound effects on the global expansion of business groups.
