Rescuing Business : Reorganizing Bankrupt Firms as Organizational Processes

Abstract

In the present paper, I examined the processes of corporate bankruptcy proceedings of the listed companies on the Korea Stock Exchange. I collected a comprehensive list of all listed companies that went bankrupt since 1990. The main findings are as follows: first, the economic crisis resulted in a number of large firms going bankrupt; second, the duration varies substantially across the firms that survived; and finally, a set of organizational characteristics such as sales, assets, firm age at the time of bankruptcy, and, most importantly, when a firm filed for bankruptcy influenced the duration of bankruptcy proceedings. These findings illustrate the impacts of key organizational factors and institutional environments on the organizational processes of post-bankruptcy proceedings toward going back to business.