A Bird’s-Eye View on Family Business Succession: Ownership Transfer Regimes and How They Change

Intra-family succession is at the heart of what makes family business unique. To explain why businesses are (not) transferred within the family, this article adopts a macroperspective, viewing succession as a specific transfer regime. Portraying the case of Germany since the 1990s, we show how this transfer regime has been changed. Using document analysis and expert interviews, we show when, how, and why the configuration of the intra-family succession regime was altered and an “exit regime” emerged. In this new regime, the family as owner is problematized, and ownership transfer is coordinated through matchmaking, which increases the importance of business intermediaries.