Exploring the impacts of corporate governance systems on competitive performances in design intensive firms

The aim of this thesis was to study how changes in corporate governance in a family firm influence the innovation process. The Family Business frameworks were used to address this research question. The thesis focused on two design-intensive firms. In particular, the two firms chosen were B&B Italia and Cassina SpA. These two firms were selected because they had several governance changes during their history. In particular, they passed through periods of familiar ownership and ages of managerial control. They were therefore ideal for analysing the impact of a different corporate governance on the innovation process. In order to evaluate firm’s innovation performances, the number of new products launched and the different collaborations established in each period were considered. Several interviews with present and past managers of the two firms were conducted to cover the whole story of this firms, from their foundation up to today. The outcome of this work was to link the Family Business frameworks with the innovation performances of each firms. What emerged is that Family Business frameworks help practitioners in predicting and evaluating innovation changes of firms.