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The international entrepreneurial dynamics of accelerated internationalisation

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Abstract

The initial stages of internationalisation, prior to firms having established their definitive sources of advantage, remain the relatively unexplored area of the international business (IB) literature. At these early stages, where firms are seeking to establish themselves, and new multinational firms are appearing to exploit new opportunities created by globalisation, the entrepreneurial aspects of internationalisation come to the fore. In this paper we aim to delineate an emerging field of IB scholarship: we use the appearance of international new ventures, and the phenomenon of accelerated internationalisation that they feature, to identify a set of issues that has slipped through the net of some of the existing IB frameworks. We propose that the salient features of accelerated and early internationalisation by the newly internationalising firm are best captured in a framework that is found at the intersection of entrepreneurial and internationalisation perspectives, which we propose be known as international entrepreneurial dynamics. We discuss such a framework in terms of entry points and pathways mapped by firms as they probe the IB arena, and the key factors that impinge on behaviour and strategic choices. In line with recent developments in the entrepreneurship literature, these are grouped into three milestones of entrepreneurial processes that extend across national boundaries: (1) the discovery of new opportunities; (2) the deployment of resources in the exploitation of these opportunities; and (3) the engagement with competitors. Implications for MNE and internationalisation theory are discussed.

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Notes

  1. PSL is the subject of a Harvard case study: see West (2001).

  2. In comparison, there were about 7000 internationally active firms in the 1960s, and 37,000 firms with 170,000 affiliates in the early 1990s (UNCTAD, 2003).

  3. Yet more firms have always been ‘global’ but kept quiet about it, focusing their efforts on maintaining a commanding position in a very narrowly defined niche market. Firms like Hauni, which after several decades continues to supply 90% of the world market for cigarette-making machines, show that suitably focused geocentric firms can sustain their world position against the efforts of even huge multinational competitors like a General Electric. These are the species ‘global niche players’ and ‘hidden champions’ (Simon, 1996).

  4. While broadly based and far-reaching, these changes are not necessarily universal. For a critical assessment, which emphasises the ‘triadisation’ of the international economy, see Rugman (2000).

  5. There are of course numerous studies on the emergence and historical development of MNEs (Hertner and Jones, 1986; Wilkins, 1991), but the entrepreneurial processes surrounding the formative years have traditionally played a marginal role, both theoretically and empirically.

  6. Dunning (1988) addresses the framework's alleged inability to account for dynamics or the process of change of international production, but focuses mainly on the dynamics of investment development paths at the country level. Mathews (2006b), Dunning (2006) and Narula (2006) debate the respective merits of the OLI framework and its capacity to account for new features of internationalisation under conditions of globalisation.

  7. The absence of a strategic element to the OLI framework is the focus of several recent studies. Melin (1992) initiated a discussion of internationalisation as driven by strategic motives, while Dunning himself (Dunning, 1995), and Dunning and Narula (1995), in the context of internationalisation of R&D activities, discussed such strategic issues, in the form of ‘strategic asset seeking’ FDI.

  8. This coincides with Toyne and Nigh's (1998: 865) suggestion that: ‘…we need to have a much deeper understanding of the process that creates, maintains, and eventually destroys the firm…’.

  9. For an alternative perspective on non-convergence in the global economy, see Craig et al. (1992).

  10. Hägerstrand (1991: 145) suggests that: ‘…there is a purely theoretical case for taking a closer look at the individual human being in his situational setting. To do so would improve our ability to relate the behaviour of small-scale elements and large-scale aggregates.’

  11. The measurement of international experience has been rather rudimentary. Some of the employed and often binary measures include work experience outside the home country and experience in selling to foreign markets (Rueber and Fischer, 1997), previous international work experience and international schooling (Bloodgood et al., 1996), and experience in international business as part of international entrepreneurial orientation (Knight and Cavusgil, 2004).

  12. The international business literature provides many examples of latecomer multinationals going abroad in search of new resources in the form of connections, partnerships and alliances, as well as customers and suppliers. Chinese firms expanding abroad from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore certainly fit such a pattern. For example, Yeung (1999) surveyed firms internationalising from Hong Kong, and found a pattern of ‘horizontal integration’ to be important, while the same scholar surveying firms expanding abroad from Singapore found that their most common motive was ‘market reach’ – meaning their desire to encompass the leading markets and the assets within them in their field. Likewise Chen and Chen (1998) found that Taiwanese firms expanding abroad did so for the pursuit of assets available only in advanced foreign countries.

  13. A similar tack is taken by Hitt et al. (1997), who link internationalisation to diversification, and define it as ‘expansion across the borders of global regions and countries into different geographic locations, or markets’.

  14. Some authors have proposed general patterns of internationalisation among born global firms of specific entry points (Hashai and Almor, 2004), sometimes with a single focus on markets as opposed to the configurations of skills, knowledge and resources that underlie the entrepreneurial idea (Coviello and Munro, 1997).

  15. According to Oviatt and McDougall (1994: 60): ‘…once successfully established, they [global start-ups] appear to have the most sustainable competitive advantages [in comparison with other international new ventures] due to a combination of historically unique, causally ambiguous, and socially complex inimitability with close network alliances in multiple countries.’ The point is that even these sources of competitive advantage may undergo significant change over time.

  16. In Toyne and Nigh's (1998) terms, societal conditions constitute the boundary conditions for activities at lower levels, for example through laws, rules and regulations governing business, tax structures, education of the workforce, and enforcement organisations. For empirical contributions, see for example Mayrhofer (2004).

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Acknowledgements

This paper was first presented at the Second Annual Conference on Emerging Research Frontiers in International Business Studies, 2004, Michigan State University. We would like to acknowledge the insightful comments and suggestions by Ari Ginsberg and two anonymous reviewers, which have been of significant help in delineating and refining our main arguments. Being unable to fully accommodate the sometimes conflicting requests, any remaining shortcomings and errors remain ours.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Macquarie Graduate School of Management, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia

    John A Mathews

  2. Uppsala University, Uppasala, Sweden

    Ivo Zander

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  1. John A Mathews
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  2. Ivo Zander
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Correspondence to John A Mathews.

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Accepted by Ari Ginsberg, Departmental Editor, 15 August 2006. This paper has been with the authors for three revisions.

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Mathews, J., Zander, I. The international entrepreneurial dynamics of accelerated internationalisation. J Int Bus Stud 38, 387–403 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.jibs.8400271

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.jibs.8400271

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