IE Articles 2019

International Marketing Review – Volume 36(1)

Special Issue on International market knowledge and international entrepreneurship in the contemporary multi speed global economy

Edited by Kevin Ibeh , David Crick and Hamid Etemad

The issue contains seven articles authored by a number of fellow IE-scholars. Please check it out here.

International Business Review  — Volume 28(2), 222-237

The dynamics of relational competencies in the development of born global firms: A multilevel approach

Sabrina Loufrani-Fedida, Valérie Hauch, Djamila Elidrissi

From a multilevel approach, this paper focuses on the born global firms and the relational competencies that they use to initiate, maintain, and expand their international social networks. To do so, we detail the three levels of relational competencies (individual, collective, and organizational) and undertake an exploratory qualitative research based on interviews with French entrepreneurs of born global firms and experts who support their development. This study allows us to reach two sets of findings: firstly, a repository of thirteen relational competencies mobilized in born global firms as well as their development mechanisms; secondly, a dynamic view of these competencies, based on initiation, consolidation and expansion situations in which relational competencies and their development mechanisms are activated. Our study may lead entrepreneurs to identify competencies they hold at all levels (individual, collective, and organizational) but without necessarily implementing, as well as provide keys to develop any that are lacking in order to improve their internationalization strategy.

International Business Review  — Volume 28(2), 268-283

A multidimensional perspective of SME internationalization speed: The influence of entrepreneurial characteristics

Linda Hsieh, John Child, Rose Narooz, Said Elbanna, Joanna Karmowska, Svetla Marinova, Pushyarag Puthusserry, Terence Tsai, Yunlu Zhang

This paper contributes to a multidimensional perspective on the speed of SME internationalization. It examines the influence of entrepreneurial characteristics – experience, rationales and innovation strategies – on multiple dimensions of internationalization speed. Findings from a sample of 180 SMEs show that earliness, speed of deepening, and speed of geographic diversification can be viewed as three different strategic alternatives and that each dimension is predicted by a different set of entrepreneurial antecedents. Earliness of internationalization is associated with entrepreneurs’ international business experience and their perception of opportunities abroad as well as preference for an innovation strategy characterized by ambidextrous innovation. Speed of deepening is related to entrepreneurs’ international business experience, their orientation towards differentiation vis-à-vis competitors, and commitment to innovation and a strategy focusing on exploration. These results indicate the importance of distinguishing between different forms of innovation. Speed of geographic diversification is predicted only by entrepreneurs’ orientation towards differentiation vis-à-vis competitors.

Journal of Business Research – Volume 95, 26-37

Internationalization speed, resources and performance: Evidence from Indian software industry

Naveen Kumar Jain, Sokol Celo, Vikas Kumar

Rapid internationalization provides firms with quick access to global markets, but also constrains their capacity to absorb the expansion. Identifying the resources and capabilities that are most likely to moderate the relationship between rapid internationalization and performance is, therefore, of great interest. We focus on the software service industry in the specific context of the Indian emerging economy and investigate the role of linkage, leverage and learning capabilities. We use a unique longitudinal dataset from the Indian software sector as a setting to test our posited relationships and our findings largely support our predictions.

Journal of Business Research — Volume 96, 250-263

SMEs’ internationalisation: When does innovation matter?

George Saridakis, , Jared M. Hansen,  Leo Paul Dana

The objective of this research is threefold: first, to investigate the role of goods, service, and process innovation on SMEs’ internationalisation (i.e., exporting); second, to investigate the association between innovation’s degree of novelty (radical innovation vs. incremental innovation) and SMEs’ internationalisation; and, third, to examine the combined effect of different types of innovation and the degrees of novelty of innovation on firms’ internationalisation and compare the findings with their individual effects. Data from 12,823 SMEs in the United Kingdom support the concept that innovative SMEs are more likely to export than non-innovative SMEs; however, the link between innovation and internationalisation differs according to the type of innovation introduced and the degree of novelty of the innovation. Of importance to managerial practice, the combined effects of different types and degrees of novelty of innovation are greater than their individual effects, creating a synergy or amplified effect.