Applying the Miles and Snow's business strategy typology to China's real estate development industry: a research framework

Strategy typologies have been widely employed to describe various business strategies within a given industry. However, few studies have applied this useful tool to China's real estate industry.! n this paper we examine business strategies of Chinese developers based on the strategy typology developed by Miles and Snow (Prospector-Analyzer-Defender-Reactor). In light of the classic SWOT framework, we examine the external and internal influences/constraints to the firms' business strategy formulations by adopting two perspectives, i.e. the strategic choice and the resource-based view, in order to identify the antecedents of the business strategy types. Factors such as 'perceived political/regulatory environmental uncertainty', 'guanxi with the local government' and 'market-linking and marketing capabilities' are suggested as significant predictors of business strategies of Chinese real estate developers and five research hypotheses are proposed. The paper aims to contribute to a better understanding on China's real estate market in general, and of the developers' strategy making behaviors in particular.