Evolution of Business

Ellen M. Korsager is an Assistant professor of business history at the Copenhagen Business School, Denmark.

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• 1. Introduction Penrose and the historical study of firm growth Subjectivity, entrepreneurial attitude, and image of context The creation of meaning The social nature of meaning Change and Geertz’ concept of culture Thick Description and narratives The case of Fiberline and the use of empirical material 2. Founding a company and formulating a basic narrative The circumstances of the start-up Pultrusion The basic narrative of Fiberline Establishing a proper motive and a founder Naming the product and the market Specifying the production process and constructing the birth of a company 3. The prior experience of Henrik Thorning and the context of the Start-up The plastic industry in Denmark in the 1970s and start 80s The development of the composite industry in Denmark Environmental concerns and organizing the industry Dukadan and Henrik Thorning’s two years working there Jotun Innovation in the Danish plastic industry 4. Putting resources to service and strengthening the basic narrative in the start-up process Getting started The first sales The everydayness of acute problems 5. How should the profiles of Fiberline be sold? Pressure building Strong export growth of the Danish plastic industry A gradual focus on sales Standard profiles and distributors The origins of the international focus The narrative of how profiles should be sold and to whom 6. The efforts of financing and opportunities for growth Continued pressure after 1983 Financing behavior over time Bootstrapping and effectuation in financing behavior 7. Productive opportunities and technological base The growth of Fiberline and of the Danish plastic industry from the mid-1980s until the late 1990s External inducements to diversification - Processed profiles and systems Internal inducements to diversification – phenol based profiles and construction profiles 8. Market focus and developing the sales organization The composites industry around the turn of the millennium Seven good years of development and organization building Establishing the sales organization Diversification and uncertainty Sales and strategic plans in the early 1990s Operational systems and the strategic plans in the late 1990s 9. Discussion The case of Fiberline and the theoretical choices I have made The study of firm growth and path dependency The study of business history The study of entrepreneurship The study of internationalization 10. Conclusion