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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Two Family Firms in Comparison: Ahlström and Schauman During the 20th Century

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Ahlstrom and Schauman are among the most prominent companies in Finnish industrial history, being family firms engaged in different branches of economic activity. At first both were mechanical wood processing companies, but diversified later into the pulp and paper industry as well. Ahlstrom is even still today an important paper producer, whilst Schauman merged in 1987 with the Kymmene Corporation, and is nowadays a part of the UPM-Kymmene Corporation. This paper analyses the strategic decision processes undertaken in the named companies during the 20 century. The companies were not the most typical ones in the Finnish wood processing industry, but were, perhaps, typical examples of old family firms facing the challenges of the modern industrial world. These two companies are not alike, which makes the comparison difficult—but also challenging. Ahlstrom and Schauman fulfil the basic definitions of family firms. A company is sometimes defined as a family firm: a) when it is owned (or at least a major part of it is) by one family, and b) it has gone through generational change—or such a change is likely (Casson, 1982; Koiranen, 1998; Laukkanen, 1994; Pollard, 1965; Rose, 1993). Both of the case companies were, or at least the major parts of them were, owned by one family and went through several generational changes from the