The first of January 1998 was the deadline for market liberalisation within the European Union, which together with the passing of the USA Telecommunications Act, has served to open up major markets in the Telecommunications Industry. This book examines the changes that have been occuring in the industry in recent years, seeking to impose a coherent structure upon a rapidly changing environment. It includes case studies of the UK, Germany and the USA.

Fifth printing: May 1997

While acquisitions and expansion strategies are understood as exciting in the business world, contraction activities are received less enthusiastically. Nevertheless, portfolio restructuring constitutes a strategic tool to increase the strategic focus of firms and achieve economies of scale and an efficient control of multiple business units. This restructuring thus has distinct implications for companies and units. The Handbook of Research on Corporate Restructuring and Globalization provides emerging research on the theoretical infrastructure for portfolio restructuring in a single piece of work and explores important topics in the field including the implications on foreign and domestic units and the degree to which increasing globalization influences restructuring practices. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as emerging markets, risk assessment, and global business, this book is ideally designed for corporate managers, government officials, scholars, researchers, and students.

Telecommunications restructurings are now seen as important barometers in the shift among developing countries toward market-based economies. They are often posited as helping developing countries "leapfrog," or accelerate their pace of development, and "connect" with the world economy. This book shows that most states in developing countries are unable to resolve the myriad pressures they face in restructuring important sectors like telecommunications to effect accelerated or "leapfrogging" development. The scope, pace, and sequencing of restructuring varies according to how different types of states respond to micro sub-sectoral pressures or to macro-level pressures from coalitions of groups. After examining seven generalizable cases (Singapore, South Korea, Mexico, Malaysia, China, Brazil, Myanmar), the book examines India as an in-depth "most likely case." Leapfrogging Development? proposes a unique framework that shows how groups and coalitions articulate development preferences and how different types of states respond to or shape these preferences.

Telecommunications provides the first comparative description of a pivotal service industry in which deregulation, privatization, and globalization have shaped corporate strategies and structure, and altered the nature of work. A chapter is devoted to each of the countries discussed: the United States, England, Canada, Australia, Japan, Germany, Italy, Norway, Mexico, and Korea. To facilitate comparisons, the authors use a common framework in analyzing changes and their implications for work and employment relations. Most employees in telecommunications, both white-collar and blue-collar, are unionized, and that has highlighted the tension between downsizing and participatory employment strategies. The authors describe adjustment paths adopted in the Anglo-Saxon countries which emphasize a technology- and market-driven approach, in contrast to Japan and several European countries where labor and social pressures have mediated the course and consequences of industrial adjustment. The strategic approach in Korea and Mexico is again different, relying on the state to set the pace and terms of change. The United States and United Kingdom have emerged as pattern leaders in the international telecommunications industry through their aggressive deregulation and restructuring. While downsizing has devastated employee morale, experiments in alternative solutions based on union and employee participation are simultaneously underway.

During the past decade, no industry has grown faster than that of mobile communications, yet coverage of its operations remains scarce. This state-of-the-art book examines the evolving structure and strategic behaviour of the thirty largest operators i