Organisational and spatial determinants of the multi-unit firm: Evidence from the French industry

This article aims to analyse the factors that determine the existence of multi-unit firms and that influence the intensity of their organisational fragmentation. More precisely, we identify the firm’s internal characteristics and their spatial, sectoral and competitive environments that are conducive (or not) to the adoption of a multi-unit form of organisation. We test these hypotheses by using a two stage Heckman type model (1979). This model allows us to take into account the determinants of the organisational choice in the intensity of multi-location. Beyond the general model, we seek to highlight that the logics differ according to the location of the firm’s head office (urban, peri-urban or rural) and according to the firm’s industrial profile (horizontal or vertical). These empirical models are based on individual data on all French industrial firms, derived from the annual survey on firms and their establishments conducted by the French National Institute of Statistics (INSEE). One of our main results is to reveal the role of this complex interaction between industrial and spatial dynamics in organisational choices.