Management buyouts and board transformation in China’s transition economy

Management buyouts (MBOs) involving the acquisition of firms by incumbent managers by who take on financial leverage, often with the involvement of private equity firms (Gilligan and Wright 2010), have become an international phenomenon. Over three decades they have diffused from the US, to Europe and to Asia (Wright et al. 2007). From OECD countries they have also played an important role in the transformation of Central and Eastern Europe (Wright et al. 1994) and more recently have emerged in China (Sun et al. 2010).