International entrepreneurship: A critical analysis of studies in the past two decades and future directions for research

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Journal of InternationalEntrepreneurship ISSN 1570-7385 J Int EntrepDOI 10.1007/s10843-012-0096-3

International entrepreneurship: A criticalanalysis of studies in the past two decadesand future directions for research

Indujeeva K. Peiris, MichèleE. M. Akoorie & Paresha Sinha

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International entrepreneurship: A critical analysisof studies in the past two decades and futuredirections for research

Indujeeva K. Peiris & Michèle E. M. Akoorie & Paresha Sinha

# Springer Science+Business Media New York 2012

Abstract International entrepreneurship (IE) is an emerging field with a rapidlygrowing body of knowledge. This paper examines gaps, issues and trends ofthe IE in the last two decades. First, it suggests an integrative framework basedon international business, entrepreneurship, strategic management, social net-work and marketing theories. The suggested model highlights the significantrole played by the entrepreneur/team, firm and network resources that act asantecedents to international opportunity development and value innovation.Second, it suggests four typologies of firms (born global, enduring global, earlyexporter and mature exporter) that can be studied under the IE theme. Finally,we discuss future research directions.

Keywords International entrepreneurship . Born global . Opportunityidentification . Knowledge and capabilities . Value innovation

Introduction

International entrepreneurship (IE) research emerged in the early 1990s as a responseto the dynamic nature of newly internationalising firms, which is perceived asanomalous to the traditional patterns of firm internationalisation (Oviatt andMcDougall 1994; McDougall et al. 1994). Over the last two decades, the IE domainhas developed extensively by drawing on various theoretical perspectives, such as

J Int EntrepDOI 10.1007/s10843-012-0096-3

I. K. Peiris (*) :M. E. M. Akoorie : P. SinhaUniversity of Waikato, Hamilton 3240, New Zealande-mail: [email protected]

M. E. M. Akooriee-mail: [email protected]

P. Sinhae-mail: [email protected]

Author's personal copy

international business (IB), entrepreneurship, strategic management, network(Mtigwe 2006) and marketing.

This growing body of knowledge has not only provided rich insights into entre-preneurial internationalisation behaviour but also made the IE theory fragmented anddevoid of a unifying theoretical direction (Keupp and Gassmann 2009; Coombs et al.2009; Zahra and George 2002). However, IE research benefited much from pastliterature reviews, which added academic and methodological rigor to the field. Theypredicted the resource-based view (RBV)’s growing influence on IE field (Peng2001); highlighted the review methodologies, methodological issues and multidisci-plinary approach to IE (Coviello and Jones 2004; Etemad and Lee 2003; Young et al.2003; Aspelund et al. 2007); review a decade or more of IE literature to identify gapsand inconsistencies; and deliver suggestions for future directions (Rialp et al. 2005a;Coombs et al. 2009; Keupp and Gassmann 2009). The recent contribution of Jones etal. (2011), presents an overview of the domain, and they highlight these inconsisten-cies and complexity by building an inventory of subject matter and domain constructsgiving a broader perspective of the IE studies to date.

Building on these previous works, this study systematically reviews 291 IE-relatedarticles, with the intention of broadening the IE paradigm by integrating multipletheoretical perspectives. We assert that a unifying theoretical direction is a challeng-ing task, but it is timely, given the need for the future development of IE domain.

Our study makes three contributions to the extant literature. First, it analyses thecontext of IE studies in terms of country-, industry-, theoretical-, environmental- andfirm-level characteristics. Second, it offers a synthesis of issues, dominant theoriesand gaps and suggests an integrative model to ground the IE domain in broadertheoretical constructs. We emphasise key elements that have not been discussedpreviously in an integrative manner. They include entrepreneurial, firm and networkresources that function as integral parts in the process of international opportunitydevelopment. In turn, these opportunities are developed and exploited to createsuperior customer value as a result of the co-evolutionary nature of entrepreneurialknowledge, capabilities and learning. Finally, it outlines ways to improve future IEscholarship, in view of increasing its rigour and scope to include both new and maturefirms.

Methods

This paper reviews 291 journal articles published in peer-reviewed journals between1993 and 2012 inclusive. We used systematic review methodology to structure thereview process as set out by Tranfield et al. (2003).

First, the review planning process was guided by the IE definition provided byStyles and Seymour (2006) to identify the articles that are closely related to the topicat hand.

‘Behavioural processes associatedwith the creation and exchange of value through theidentification and exploitation of opportunities that cross national borders’ (p. 134).

The Styles and Seymour (2006) definition was selected as it presents a holisticview of IE domain and incorporates opportunity-related behaviours, events and

I.K. Peiris et al.


processes, that goes beyond the legal entity of the focal firm and considers multiplefirms, actors and resources (Chandra et al. 2012). Unlike other definitions, it makesthe IE domain independent of firm size and age and enabled us to set the objectivecriteria for screening the articles that are closely related to the status quo of the fieldand to focus on key identified areas from a multi-level perspective (entrepreneurial,firm, networks and environmental factors).

Second, our search process included key word searches (international entrepre-neurship; internationalisation; international firms; international new ventures; bornglobal; born-again global; international marketing; global start-ups; early, rapid oraccelerated internationalisation; and export ventures) using electronic databases suchas Ebsco-host, Elsevier Science Direct and Proquest. We excluded books, bookchapters and conference proceedings since journal publications are considered ashaving the highest impact in the management field and considered as validatedknowledge (Tahai and Meyer 1999; Podsakoff et al. 2005).

Third, a bibliometric search was also conducted to identify highly citedarticles using citation databases: ISI Web of Science, SCOPUS and Publish orPerish (software) (Harzing 2007) that uses Google Scholar to obtain raw citations.Using this method, we limited keywords to ‘international entrepreneurship’, ‘bornglobal’ and ‘international new ventures’. The objective here was to recognise thearticles that had a significant impact on IE research and the extent of their dependenceon building the existing IE knowledge base (Etemad and Lee 2003).

Fourth, we conducted a search by going through all the journals that hadpublished three or more articles on IE studies during the last two decades(1993–2012). These journals were: European Journal of Marketing (9), EuropeanManagement Journal (9), Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice (8), InternationalBusiness Review (34), International Marketing Review (13), International SmallBusiness Journal (7), Journal of Business Venturing (11), Journal of Euromarketing(6), Journal of Global Marketing (4), Journal of International Business Studies (26),Journal of International Entrepreneurship (59), Journal of International Marketing(17), Journal of Small Business and Entrepreneurship Development (5), Journal ofSmall Business Management (12), Journal of World Business (17), ManagementInternational Review (11) and Small Business Economics (8). We did not limit thesearch to incorporate only top journals in the respective fields (entrepreneurship andsmall business management, IB, marketing and strategic management); rather, thearticle selection was based on the aim of capturing the theoretical and empiricalcontributions that have added value to the IE field.

Articles found in the above search methods were screened after reading thetitle, abstract and the conclusion, which resulted in shortlisting 366 articlesthat had a bearing on IE studies. After a thorough review, we selected 291articles which all three authors agreed were highly relevant to IE literature forthe final analysis (see Appendix 2). The theoretical base of the IE research hasbecome very broad, multidisciplinary and extends over two decades. Therefore, acareful assessment and positioning of the literature relevant to this study has been achallenging task. This selection is not fully exhaustive but includes highly relevantand representative selections of academic work. The excluded articles either focusedon SME internationalisation without looking at entrepreneurial intervention per se orthey were focusing on issues related to multinational firms, export performance

International entrepreneurship: A critical analysis


measures, foreign direct investment, globalisation and macro-environmentalinfluences.

Analysis

The selected scholarly literature was analysed using an interpretive synthesisingapproach (Noblit and Hare 1988), where key categories were identified as higher-order concepts (entrepreneurial, firm, environmental and networks) that integratevarious theoretical approaches such as entrepreneurship, IB, strategic management,marketing and network theories (Dixon-Woods et al. 2005). We used a combinationof thematic and content analysis (Weed 2008) in order to capture the quantitative(frequency) as well as qualitative (explanatory value) aspects of the data. We prepareda summary table where each article was coded and categorised systematically, basedon topic, year, firm size, country, industry, time frame, theoretical framework,analytical approach, variables (independent, moderator, mediator, dependent andcontrol) and key findings. These facilitated theme identification and provided detaileddescription related to the higher-order concepts and refinement of constructs of theintegrative framework.

Results

The study identified IE articles published in 38 peer-reviewed journals across mul-tiple disciplines during the period 1993 to 2012. We started from Rennie’s (1993)article about ‘born-global’ firms, where the term ‘born global’ first entered the IEdomain and the seminal work of Oviatt and McDougall (1994) where the first seed ofIE field germinated (Autio 2005). Since then, the IE literature has expanded expo-nentially drawing from multiple theoretical perspectives, adding rigor, refining andbroadening the conceptual foundations to reach the present state (see Fig. 1. Therewere only five articles in 2012, so we omitted this value).

Table 1 summarises where and when the articles were published. Out of 291papers reviewed, 52 % were in IB journals, 19 % in entrepreneurship journals, 18 %in marketing journals and 12 % in strategic management and other related disciplines.A surge of literature appeared from 2003 to 2008, mainly due to increasing interest inthe international new venture (INV)/born-global (BG) phenomenon, which

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011

Number of articles

Fig. 1 Growth of IE articles

I.K. Peiris et al.


Table 1 IE article representation in journals

Journal 93–96

97–00

01–04

05–08

09–12

Percentage Total

International Business 52 % 151

Journal of International Entrepreneurship 0 0 12 23 24 59

International Business Review 1 3 8 12 10 34

Journal of International Business Studies 1 3 1 15 6 26

Journal of World Business 0 0 0 13 4 17

Management International Review 0 1 3 6 1 11

Journal of International Management 0 0 2 0 0 2

Regional Studies 0 0 0 2 0 2

Entrepreneurship 19 % 55

Journal of Small Business Management 0 4 5 2 1 12

Journal of Business Venturing 3 0 5 2 1 11

Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice 1 0 2 3 2 8

International Small Business Journal 0 0 4 0 3 7

Small Business Economics 0 0 3 3 1 7

Journal of Small Business and EnterpriseDevelopment

0 0 0 0 5 5

Entrepreneurship and Regional Development 0 0 1 1 2 4

International Journal of Entrepreneurship 0 0 0 0 1 1

Marketing 18 % 51

Journal of International Marketing 0 7 3 3 4 17

International Marketing Review 0 0 2 7 4 13

European Journal of Marketing 2 0 1 3 3 9

Journal of Euromarketing 0 0 0 6 0 6

Journal of Global Marketing 0 1 1 1 1 4

Journal of Marketing Management 0 0 0 1 0 1

Industrial Marketing Management 0 0 0 1 0 1

Strategic/General Management 12 % 34

European Management Journal 0 0 0 7 2 9

Academy of Management Journal 0 4 0 0 0 4

Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences 0 0 3 1 0 4

Journal of Management 0 0 1 1 1 3

Academy of Management Executive 1 0 1 0 0 2

Scandinavian Journal of Management 0 0 1 1 0 2

Academy of Management Review 0 0 0 1 0 1

Asia Pacific Journal of Management 0 0 1 0 0 1

International Studies of Management andOrganization

0 1 0 0 0 1

Journal of Management Studies 0 0 0 0 1 1

Long Range Planning 0 0 0 1 0 1

Strategic Management Journal 0 0 1 0 0 1

Thunderbird Intl Business Review 0 0 0 1 0 1



contributed to over 70 % of the articles. A number of special issues focusingon IE (European Management Journal, 2008, issue 26; International MarketingReview, 2006, issue 23) and early and rapid internationalisation of the firm(Journal of World Business, 2007, issue 42) were published during this period.With the emergence of the dedicated journal for IE in 2003 (Journal ofInternational Entrepreneurship), IE-specific article numbers steadily increasedadding breadth and depth to this emerging field. Furthermore, the Journal ofInternational Business studies published some of the most highly cited articlesin IE to date (Coviello 2006; Jones and Coviello 2005; Mudambi and Zahra 2007;Zahra 2005; Zhou et al. 2007; Oviatt and McDougall 1994). Except for theEuropean Management Journal (nine articles), the Academy of ManagementJournal (four) and the Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences (four), theIE literature had hardly made an appearance in the core strategic managementjournals.

Global focus

The studies clearly indicate that IE research is found in every part of the world (seeTable 2). To conserve space, we have only shown countries with two or more studies.Studies emanating from European region has the highest representation (53 %)followed by Oceania (15 %), North America (13 %), East Asia (11 %), Middle East(3 %), South Asia (2 %), East Asia (2 %), Africa (2 %) and South America (2 %). Asan emerging economy, China (eight articles) is attracting attention from researchers.Yet, the attention given to other emerging BRIC countries such as India (two), Brazil(one) and other developing country markets, especially, agriculture-based traditionalexporters in Asian countries is negligible. Literature about how companies in emerg-ing countries enter into international markets in the Middle East and South Asia isalmost non-existent.

There were 30 multi-country studies (see Table 3) that focused on country-level differences in rapid internationalisation (Loane and Bell 2006; Gassmann andKeupp 2007), comparison of internationalisation processes (Hadley and Wilson2003; Gankema et al. 2000; Spence and Crick 2006), attitude differences (Sommer2010), impact of cultural context (Brettel et al. 2009; Thomas and Mueller 2000),positional advantage (Blesa et al. 2008) and entrepreneurial characteristics (Turan andKara 2007). This highlights the importance of collaborative publications by IE

Table 1 (continued)

Journal 93–96

97–00

01–04

05–08

09–12

Percentage Total

Journal of Family Business strategy 0 0 0 0 1 1

Technovation 0 0 0 0 1 1

McKinsey Quarterly 1 0 0 0 0 1

Total 10 24 61 117 79 291

I.K. Peiris et al.


scholars to enrich our understanding about the influence of different researchcontexts.

Industry and firm type

The most prevalent sector for IE studies has been manufacturing (142) (seeTable 4). Supporting the findings of earlier studies, an increasing number of studieshave focused on High-Tech manufacturing (49) and ICT sectors (17) (Coviello andJones 2004; Zahra and George 2002). Other sectors of interest were services (five),trading (three) and agriculture (three). There were also comparative studies oftraditional and new industries (Dimitratos et al. 2004; Mort and Weerawardena2006; Gemser et al. 2004; Chetty and Agndal 2007; Agndal et al. 2008; Bell et al.2001).

The focus of IE research appears to have narrowed down to high-technologyfirms, new ventures (95) and SMEs (with <500 employees; 161) (see Tables 4and 5). The under-representation of large firms can be attributed to how scholarsdefined the IE domain in the early stages (McDougall 1989; Oviatt and McDougall

Table 2 Countries studied

Country 93–96 97–00 01–04 05–08 09–12 Percentage Total

Finland 0 1 1 13 7 13 % 22

USA 2 7 6 2 1 11 % 18

Sweden 0 3 5 3 6 10 % 17

UK 0 3 5 6 3 10 % 17

Australia 1 0 4 6 5 9 % 16

Spain 0 0 0 11 5 9 % 16

New Zealand 0 3 4 4 1 7 % 12

China 0 0 0 3 5 5 % 8

Germany 0 0 0 1 7 5 % 8

Canada 1 1 3 0 1 4 % 6

Ireland 0 0 0 0 4 2 % 4

Italy 0 0 2 2 0 2 % 4

Turkey 0 0 0 2 2 2 % 4

Greece 0 0 1 1 1 2 % 3

Malaysia 0 0 0 2 1 2 % 3

India 0 0 1 0 1 1 % 2

Japan 0 0 1 1 0 1 % 2

The Netherlands 0 0 1 1 0 1 % 2

Singapore 0 0 0 2 0 1 % 2

Slovenia 0 0 0 2 0 1 % 2

Taiwan 0 0 0 2 0 1 % 2

Total 170



Table 3 Number of multicountystudies

Number of studies

Sweden/New Zealand 4

Australia/New Zealand 3

UK/Australia/New Zealand 2

Australia/Canada 1

Austria/Belgium/Finland 1

Austria/Belgium/Finland/UK/The Netherlands/Norway/Sweden/Switzerland

1

Austria/Switzerland/Liechtenstein/Germany 1

Canada/UK 1

Canada/Ireland/Australia/New Zealand 1

Czech/Germany/France/UK/USA 1

Czech/Austria/Slovenia 1

Finland/Ireland/Norway 1

Germany/UK/France/Italy 1

Germany/UK 1

Germany/Thailand 1

Greece/Caribbean 1

Greece/Norway/Finland/Italy 1

Israel/Finland 1

Norway/Sweden/Finland 1

Norway/Denmark/France 1

Norway/France 1

Sweden/Finland 1

UK/USA 1

USA/Canada 1

Total 30

Table 4 Industry representation of IE research

Industry 93–96 97–00 01–04 05–08 09–12 Percentage Total

Manufacturing

High-tech 3 5 7 19 15 24 % 49

Traditional 0 3 11 19 21 27 % 54

Mixed 3 6 10 15 5 19 % 39

ICT 2 2 3 3 7 8 % 17

Services 0 3 0 2 0 2 % 5

Agriculture 0 0 2 1 0 1 % 3

Trading 0 0 1 1 1 1 % 3

Mixed (manufacturing and services) 1 1 9 14 8 16 % 33

I.K. Peiris et al.


1994), which gave prominence to new and knowledge-intensive firms (Zahra2005). A few attempts were subsequently made to broaden the conceptualboundaries through definitional changes (McDougall and Oviatt 2000; Zahraand George 2002; Mtigwe 2006; Styles and Gray 2006; Jones and Coviello 2005;Styles and Seymour 2006). We see a positive trend in this regard; Table 5 shows thatcurrent focus is shifting towards IE studies becoming independent of firm sizeand age.

Theoretical frameworks

The rapid growth of IE literature over two decades has added an impressivevolume of research on international entrepreneurial ventures using different butoverlapping concepts. With the objective of consolidating the theoretical andterminology differences, our review perceives, Born Global (Knight and Cavusgil2004; Madsen and Servais 1997; Rennie 1993), International New Venture (Oviattand McDougall 1994, 2005c), Born International (Kundu and Katz 2003), NewEntrepreneurial Ventures (Brettel et al. 2009), Global Smaller Firm (Dimitratos etal. 2010), Instant Exporters (McAuley 1999) and Early Internationalizing Firms(Rialp et al. 2005a) as a subset of IE theory and therefore focuses on bothnew and established ventures that engaged in cross-border value-exchangeprocesses.

The contribution of conceptual (51 articles) and literature review (12) articles inthe last two decades exemplifies the emerging sophistication of IE theory andexemplary efforts taken to place IE as a distinct domain in IB literature. Theseconceptual developments have shed light on key constructs that constitute theboundary of IE research (entrepreneur, firm and resources). Appendix 1 presentsthe most frequently used contemporary theories in empirical research. We found 49articles to be devoid of a clear theoretical underpinning. However, on a positive note,it is encouraging to see IE research using, multiple theoretical perspectives toexamine this complex phenomenon as recommended by IE scholars (Etemad2004a; Johanson and Vahlne 2009; Chetty and Cambell-Hunt 2004; Crick andSpence 2005; Mathews and Zander 2007; Freeman et al. 2010; Mejri and Umemoto2010; Jones and Coviello 2005).

The seminal work of Oviatt and McDougall (1994) and some highly influentialconceptual and empirical papers emerged throughout 2001–2012. The next sectionfocuses on their work and the impact of some of the influential theories thatcontributed to the development of IE research domain.

Table 5 Size of firms studied under IE theme

Firm size 93–96 97–00 01–04 05–08 09–12 Percentage Total

SME 5 14 34 55 53 82 % 161

Large 1 1 3 4 2 6 % 11

Mixed 1 5 14 4 12 % 24



Theories guiding IE research

Resource-based view

Oviatt and McDougall’s (1994) introduction of INVs, and integration of strategicmanagement with entrepreneurship was a key breakthrough that diverted scholarsattention from mainstream IB theories (see Appendix 1) to the INV perspective. Theycontended that sustainable competitive advantage of INV depended on having accessto and being able to control unique resources, giving particular attention to ‘knowl-edge’ as a key resource. RBV (now resource-based theory (Barney et al. 2011)emerged as a main contender to the traditional internationalisation (process theories)theories and remains until today as one of the dominant and widely used theoreticalperspectives (49 empirical studies) in understanding the IE phenomenon. The RBTidentifies the firm as a ‘unique bundles of accumulated tangible and intangibleresources stocks’ (Roth 1995), such as assets, capabilities, processes, routines andknowledge. From the IE perspective, this means unique tacit knowledge about globalopportunities and the capability to leverage such knowledge to gain competitiveadvantage (Peng 2001). IE scholars have focused on firm-level knowledge (Knight2000; Knight and Cavusgil 2004; Knight and Kim 2009); influence of top manage-ment exposure (Bloodgood et al. 1996); entrepreneurs human capital (Westhead et al.2001), market knowledge (Lamb and Liesch 2002), organisational (firm size), enter-prise (psychological predisposition) and technological intensity (Dhanaraj andBeamish 2003); network resources (Coviello and Cox 2006; Loane and Bell 2006);institutional capital (Lu et al. 2010); and intangible resources (people-dependenthuman capital and people-independent intangible resources: organisational capital,technological capital and relational capital), firm capabilities (individual interactionsand organisational routines) (Rialp and Rialp 2007) and entrepreneurial capability(Zhang et al. 2009). The RBT influence in IE is critical to the future development ofthe field. However, it is evident that the scholars have used RBT to ground theirvariables to explain the internationalisation process paying little or no attention tohow these resources come into existence and the process of resource development forsustainable competitive advantage. Furthermore, we still have inadequate knowledgeabout the specific type of resources that are critical to entrepreneurial international-isation process and their influence.

Knowledge-based view

Our review suggests the knowledge-based view (KBV) has filled this gap partially byidentifying knowledge as the most important resource of all (Yli-Renko et al. 2002).From the time since Uppsala model was first developed (Johanson and Vahlne 1977),experiential knowledge has been studied extensively by IE researchers, but theapplication of KBV and organisational learning perspective in IE-related studies didnot emerge until the year 2000. KBV in IE is primarily associated with the concept ofknowledge intensity (the extent of dependency in existing knowledge base of thefirm) (Autio et al. 2000). Yli Renko et al. (2002) found a positive relationshipbetween knowledge intensity and international sales growth. On a similar note,Gassmann and Keupp (2007) suggested the integration of social capital (SC) theory

I.K. Peiris et al.


with KBV in order to understand the basis and realisation of competitive advantage ofthe BG firm. However, we found that there is still limited understanding with regardto knowledge-acquisition process (Weerawardena et al. 2007); process of knowledgegeneration (Freeman et al. 2010); relationship between knowledge, capabilities andinternationalisation (Kuivalainen et al. 2010); and knowledge types that affect inter-nationalisation (Mejri and Umemoto 2010).

Dynamic capabilities

In 2002, the dynamic capabilities (DC) perspective first entered the IE literaturethrough the conceptual work of Knudsen and Madsen (2002). They highlighted theimportance of unique knowledge creation and information flows through explorationof new capabilities and exploitation of current capabilities and regarded them as keydrivers in export strategy development. Jantunen et al. (2005) found empiricalsupport for the DC perspective from a firm-level reconfiguration of capabilities, suchas implementing new strategy, structure, methods and business processes in relationto a subjective measure of profitability but failed to establish a positive relationshipwith the degree of internationalisation. However, focusing on a specific networkingcapability of the entrepreneurial owner/manager, Mort and Weerawardena (2006)found strong support for identification and exploitation of market opportunities andinternational market performance of BG firms. Extending the same view,Weerawardenaet al. (2007) conceptualised that the capability building process is entrepreneuriallydriven and consist of knowledge acquisition through market and internally focusedlearning and networking capabilities. There is support from the literature about thepositive impact of certain capabilities, particularly related to networking and learning(Schweizer et al. 2010; Evers 2011) capabilities in the internationalisation process.Nevertheless, our knowledge about dynamic capabilities and its impact on theinternationalisation process is still in its infancy. There is still confusion about whatexactly a dynamic capability is. Moreover, the boundary between a resource and acapability seems to be blurred. As such, scholars have considered general experience,having access to finance, learning and relationship building as individual-levelcapabilities and entrepreneurial orientation (EO), marketing orientation, ambidexter-ity, R&D, product diversification, customer orientation and unique resources as firm-level dynamic capabilities (Kocak and Abimbola 2009; Kuivalainen et al. 2010;Evers 2011; Prange and Verdier 2011) which are related to firm performance.

Integrating DC perspective into IE research is advantageous to the development ofthe field. Understanding DC from an entrepreneurial perspective will enhance ourknowledge about how entrepreneurs or the entrepreneurial team adapt, build, inte-grate and reconfigure knowledge and resources to build sustainable competitiveadvantage of the firm.

Network and SC theory

Network theory has made a significant contribution to the IE domain and has becomea widely used approach in understanding the internationalisation process of entrepre-neurial firms (49). Both business networks and social networks have been widelystudied by scholars; the former has shed light to the understanding of the antecedents



of internationalisation, primarily from an inter-firm perspective, whereas the latter hasbroaden the scope to include all of entrepreneurs interpersonal ties (Ellis 2011). Outof the studies that focused on tie strength (19), some have found weak ties to beimportant than strong ties at the venture formation stage, whereas others found bothstrong and weak ties important at different stages of the firm internationalisationprocess (Gemser et al. 2004; Freeman et al. 2006; Evers and O’Gorman 2011;Kontinen and Ojala 2011). Though there are differences in these two types (in termsof amount of time, emotional intensity, intimacy and reciprocity), trying to ascertainwhich one is more important is not going to be a fruitful debate in the future. Webelieve it is prudent to focus on the ‘exchange value’ that these ties generate in termsof trust and transaction-cost perspectives (Tsai and Ghoshal 1998; Prashantham andDhanaraj 2010; Ring and Van De Ven 1994). Furthermore, scant attention has beengiven to understanding network structures. We found only three articles focusing onissues related to network centrality, density and structural holes (Zhou et al. 2007;Al-Laham and Souitaris 2008; Coviello 2006). Coviello (2006) found growth ofnetworks positively relates to firm growth and increase in centrality but leads to adecline in network density. However, there is lack of empirical support for thesefindings. Therefore, future studies need to see network structures from a multi polarnetworks perspective (Wright and Dana 2003) in order to understand the strategicimportance of network relationships.

We aver that SC theory is capable of providing a strong foundation for the networkperspective in internationalisation research. SC has emerged as a recent phenomenon in IEresearch (we found only nine empirical studies), but it has the capability of providing richinsights into liabilities of networks, growth and decay of ties, as a bundle of resources andthe dynamic roles it plays (serendipity, efficacy and liability) in reducing uncertainty in theinternational market (Yli-Renko et al. 2002; Chetty and Agndal 2007; Agndal et al.2008; Tuppura et al. 2008; Musteen et al. 2010; Prashantham and Dhanaraj 2010;Kontinen and Ojala 2011; Prashantham and Young 2011; Evald et al. 2011).

Future researchers may find it beneficial if they clearly identify the differencesbetween organisational-level networks and individual-level networks and the inter-action between the two. Another interesting direction is to study the network influ-ence based on ‘formal’ and ‘informal’ organisational and interpersonal-levelnetworks. Table 6 summarises network themes emerging from the studies related tothe internationalising firm.

Marketing theory and value creation

In today’s competitive environments, customer value creation can be considered asthe key fundamental element in marketing (Moran and Ghoshal 1996). However, IEscholars have given almost negligible attention to the value creation aspect in theinternationalisation process. When it comes to creation of value, researchers haveprimarily focused on innovation at product and process levels (Dib et al. 2010; Crick2009; Mort and Weerawardena 2006; Weerawardena et al. 2007; Gassmann andKeupp 2007) with the exception of a few studies that have focussed onorganisational-wide innovation (O’Cass and Weerawardena 2009; Kocak and

I.K. Peiris et al.


Abimbola 2009). Other studies have looked at sources of value creation (Rialp et al.2005b), value-maximising strategic choices (resources and competencies) (Mudambiand Zahra 2007), nature of value-creating activity (marketing, distribution, produc-tion and R&D) (Melén and Nordman 2009), value-adding capability (Prange andVerdier 2011) and risk management and resource leverage for value creation (Mort etal. 2012). Table 7 represents the results of the thematic frequency analysis, inidentifying how firms create value in their respective markets.

Recent research that focuses on a business model construct offers an alter-native viewpoint to value creation from a broader perspective encompassingupstream (suppliers) and downstream (sales partners and customers) valueexchange. It identified value creation drivers (novelty, complementarity, effi-ciency or customer lock in) and ways of linking the firm with value-addingpartners (contents, structure and governance) indicating a possible future direc-tion with regard to the impact of value-exchange interface in IE research(Sainio et al. 2011).

Integration of process theory and INV theory

Our review found support for the integration of process theory with INV theory(Schwens and Kabst 2011). The process theory continued to attract IE researchersbecause of its simplicity and understandable nature of the internationalisation processand the similarities with the INV theory (Melén and Nordman 2009). Some researchfound no significant differences in BG and traditional firms when it comes to strategicand financial performance, innovativeness and risk-taking propensity (Zhang et al.2009). Table 8 indicates that stage theory is widely applied in the traditional manu-facturing and service sectors in mature organisations. However, there is an overlapand stage theory has been used in both sectors, suggesting the possible integrativenature of the two theories.

The outcome of this literature review section evidently illustrates the importance ofusing multiple theoretical perspectives in understanding the IE phenomenon. In the

Table 6 Advantages of networksand SC

aValues represent frequency ofthemes and not the number ofarticles

Themes Frequency

Provide knowledge/information/expertise 12a

Internationalisation opportunities 10

Access to resources 7

Client followership 5

Support innovation/new ideas 4

Learning opportunities 2

Motivation 1

Compensate lack of experience 1

Build reputation and trust 1

Reduce uncertainty 1

Increase scope 1



next section, we focus on the impact of entrepreneurship theory and entrepreneurialbehaviour on the internationalisation process.

Entrepreneurship theory

Since the first INV conceptualisation, the role of entrepreneurship in IE research hasbeen identified as a key aspect of the field, but its application has been a recent

Table 7 Factors contributing to value creation and competitive advantage of the firm

Theme Frequency

Unique product/global product 15a

R&D intensity/patents 14

Strategy–niche focus 14

Organisational knowledge 12

Superior quality 10

Technological advantage/competence 10

Channels development 9

Customer focus/value/relationships 9

Innovation 9

Managerial/resource commitment 8

Organisational learning 8

Unique intangible assets 8

Brand name/branding strategy 6

Market knowledge 6

Network knowledge 6

Strategic planning 6

Growth orientation 5

Market research 5

Structure and systems 5

Capability to use resources 4

a Values represent the frequency of times these themes were identified as important to the firm and not thenumber of studies since two or three themes may occur in one article

Table 8 Process and INV theory application

Theoretical perspective Knowledge intensive Others

Young Mature Mixed Young Mature Mixed

Stage theory Supported 4 2 1 13 6

INV theory Supported 26a 4 7 16 9 12

Integration of the 2 Supported 1 2 2 3 5

a Values represent the number of studies that used either or both of these theories

I.K. Peiris et al.


phenomenon. Three main streams have emerged in entrepreneurship theories. First,Jones and Coviello (2005) and Etemad (2004a) theorised that the entrepreneur, thefirm and the environment are core concepts in IE theory and this accentuated thevalue of capturing entrepreneurial behaviour over time in the cyclic process ofinternationalisation. Another theoretical paper looked at the speed of internationali-sation (Oviatt and McDougall 2005a), initiated by entrepreneurial opportunity. Inter-national ‘opportunity identification’ became an emergent theme in IE research from2006, with many scholars contributing to comprehend the interplay between ‘oppor-tunity’ and variables such as commitment and knowledge (Johanson and Vahlne2006), to understand and define the IE domain (Styles and Seymour 2006), rationaliseaccelerated/successful internationalisation (Mathews and Zander 2007; Di Gregorioet al. 2008; Muzychenko 2008) and introducing the opportunity-based view inunderstanding the IE process (Chandra et al. 2012).

The second stream of research has focused on having the right mind-set, itsdevelopment and impact on choice of opportunities and value creation in foreignmarkets. Zahra et al. (2005) used the cognitive perspective (motivation and influenceof: experience, environment, self-efficacy mental models, heuristics and learning), toexamine opportunity identification and exploitation to explain the BG phenomenon.This study signifies the value of knowing the minds of entrepreneurs and their mentalmodels that can guide and shape internationalisation decisions. Similarly, Butler et al.(2010) used the cognitive approach to explain why some individuals are able to noticeopportunities in international environments albeit with high levels of uncertainty, byfocusing on the ability of the entrepreneur to absorb uncertainty and use creativity totake entrepreneurial actions.

The third and most recent theoretical contribution comes from the seminal work ofSarasvathi’s (2001) ‘effectuation logic’ (a process initiated by a set of means as givenand creating possible outcomes with that set of means). Since 2010, effectuationtheory has been used to understand the venture creation and early development process ofthe BG firm, from the entrepreneur and network perspective (Andersson 2011; Evers andO’Gorman 2011), effect on entry modes (Harms and Schiele 2012), exploitation ofcontingencies and decision making (Schweizer et al. 2010; Mort et al. 2012).

Significance of the entrepreneurship theory

The IE process starts with the exploitation of international entrepreneurialopportunities (Oviatt and McDougall 2005a; Ellis 2011), discovered by individuals(Venkataraman 1997). Therefore, it is safe to say that the IE process is founded anddriven by the acts of the entrepreneur or the entrepreneurial team (Etemad 2004a, b).The central role played by the entrepreneur is a more recent development and is stillin its infancy. However, there is no clear agreement of which elements are the mostinfluent aspects of entrepreneurial capacities and resources. Our thematic analysisresults identified the leading aspects of entrepreneurial competencies used by IEstudies (see Table 9).

Apart from the themes identified above, the majority of IE studies havelooked at strategic orientations or mind-sets of the entrepreneurs or of the firm.Some of the most commonly used constructs include risk taking, innovativenessand pro-activeness which when combined, is also called EO (Covin and Slevin



1991; Lumpkin and Dess 1996; Miller and Friesen 1978). EO is a behaviour thatinvestigates firm-level strategic orientation as having an influence on variousoutcome variables such as performance and venture growth. Even though somestudies found evidence that all three dimensions were associated with rapidinternationalisation (Dib et al. 2010; Dimitratos et al. 2010; Acedo and Jones 2007;Pla-Barber and Escribá-Esteve 2006; Acedo and Florin 2006), opportunity identifi-cation (Chandra et al. 2009) and international performance (Kropp et al. 2006), onestudy did not find a connection between EO and degree of internationalisation(Jantunen et al. 2005) and some studies found only the innovative dimension as asignificant predictor of international performance (Kropp et al. 2006; Zhou 2007).Furthermore, Frishammer and Andersson (2009) did not find innovativeness or risktaking having any significant effects on performance. These results raise doubts overusing EO as a main construct in determining the entrepreneurial behaviour of aninternationalising firm.

The over emphasis on EO has ignored the importance of the opportunity recognitionaspect of the IE process. The existing theories assume implicitly that internationalisationis preceded by opportunity recognition, but provide little explanations about this processor the capabilities individuals need to identify these opportunities (Chandra et al. 2009;Acedo and Jones 2007). We found support for both serendipitous discoveries of anextant prior opportunity as well as finding an opportunity that was waiting to bediscovered as a result of active search. A third related but distinct category iswhere entrepreneurs actively create opportunities that can be exploited usinginnovative approaches and products that promote faster market entry (Mort etal. 2012). This opens up a novel and a much broader way of looking at opportunitiesincorporating marketing as well as environmental factors in order to understand it inits entirety.

Table 9 Entrepreneurial compe-tencies/resources that affectinternationalisation

Entrepreneurial competencies Frequency

Global focus/vision/intention 22

Network capability/knowledge 20

Technical knowledge 13

Commitment 13

Skills/competence 13

Creativity and innovation 13

Risk taking 12

Attitude 10

Experiential learning 10

Proactiveness 10

Experiential knowledge 8

Education 7

Ability to identify opportunities 7

Self-confidence/self-efficacy 5

Persistence/perseverance 4

I.K. Peiris et al.


Entrepreneurship scholars consider creativity as a fundamental element in theentrepreneurial process (Brazeal and Herbert 1999; Kirzner 1999; Ward 2004; Koand Butler 2007; Wiklund et al. 2007; Baron and Tang 2011) which is capable ofexplaining the creative combination of resources and innovative outcomes. However,IE scholars are only beginning to appreciate the importance of the role played by‘creativity’ in understanding its impact on the internationalisation process (Styles andSeymour 2006). Similarly, self-efficacy plays an important role in shaping the level ofeffort, resilience to adversity and perseverance (Chen et al. 2004; Bandura 1997). Ithas the capacity to provide insights into why entrepreneurs see opportunities insteadof risks and their level of commitment in pursuing international opportunities. Fillis(2001) suggests that SME behaviour in the internationalisation process could bebetter understood by looking at the entrepreneurs marketing skills, resource avail-ability, creativity and identification of opportunities. These constructs are found to bea robust measure of explaining entrepreneurial actions (Baum and Locke 2004; Baumet al. 2001; Erikson 2002; Ardichvili et al. 2003; Forbes 2005; Shepherd andDeTienne 2005; Zahra et al. 2005; McGee et al. 2009).

The existing entrepreneurship literature supports the notion that alertness,creativity, cognition, prior knowledge and optimistic behaviour is correlatedwith opportunity identification (Ardichvili et al. 2003; Butler et al. 2010;Lumpkin et al. 2004; Shane and Venkataraman 2000; Zahra et al. 2005; Gaglio andKatz 2001). However, current research on opportunity identification does not specif-ically look at the role that learning plays in this process (Corbett 2005). This is animportant element that connects the constructs such as previous knowledge, self-efficacy and creativity and uncovers how individuals combine these constructs withexisting knowledge stocks (Kolb et al. 2001; Rae and Carswell 2001). Baron (2004)argues that entrepreneurial abilities are dependent on how we acquire, store, trans-form and use information. To date, the IE literature offers little explanation as to howindividuals acquire and transform this information, thereby questioning the pivotalrole of learning.

Knowledge is referred to what is known (either explicitly or tacitly) andlearning refers to the process by which knowledge is generated (Harrison andLeitch 2005). Autio et al. (2000) state both knowledge and learning are critical andhave an impact on international growth. Entrepreneurial learning occurs whenknowledge is acquired through learning by doing or by direct observation (Minnitiand Bygrave 2001). On a similar note, Johanson and Vahlne (2009) state thatopportunity development is an interactive process, characterised by gradual develop-ment of experiential learning.

Environmental dynamics

The impact of external environment is fundamental to the internationalising firm. Itcontinuously interacts with the internationalisation process as a moderator variableand a driver of change (Jones and Coviello 2005). Table 10 highlights the threeinfluential factors in the environment: market, industry and competitive factors. Wefound that having a limited domestic market is a major reason for firms to enterinternational markets. The integration of domestic and international environment into



the IE process maybe a useful way forward for IE researchers. IE process is acomplex phenomenon and in order to appreciate its breadth and depth, future researchmust focus on the overall configuration of these activities and their associations toorganisational performance.

In the next section, we suggest a definitional change and refine the IE constructs toincorporate the existing knowledge base to build a conceptual model and define theboundary of IE domain.

The future of IE research

McDougall and Oviatt’s (2000) definition can be considered as the first formaldefinition of the field: ‘… a combination of innovative, proactive and risk-seekingbehaviour that crosses national borders and is intended to create value in organisa-tion’ (p. 903). However, the establishment of entrepreneurship theory into IE emergedfrom the work of Zahra and George (2002). They introduced the notion of opportu-nity discovery and exploitation into the IE research that was later recognised as acritical element in the field (Chandra et al. 2009; Johanson and Vahlne 2006, 2009;Freeman and Cavusgil 2007; Butler et al. 2010).

We believe Styles and Seymour’s (2006) definition holds great promise as a basisfor IE theory building. However, we suggest that this definition needs to incorporatethe cognitive perspective of the entrepreneur, i.e., ‘intentions’. Grounded in Ajzen’s(1991) theory of planned behaviour, we posit that without intentions there will not bean entrepreneurial behavioural process to begin with.

Therefore, we redefine IE as ‘the cognitive and behavioural processes associatedwith the creation and exchange of value through the identification and exploitation ofopportunities that cross national borders’.

Table 10 Environmental influen-ces in IE research

Theme Frequency

Lack/hostile domestic market 25

Industry specific/global integration 17

Market demand/size/profit potential 15

Competitive dynamics 10

Government support 7

Changing ICT 6

Culture 6

Geographic location/country of origin 6

Globalisation 4

Regulatory change 4

Institutional environment 3

Changing consumer preferences 2

Changing manufacturing 1

Resource availability 1

I.K. Peiris et al.


Having a broader definition paves the way for more integrative approaches andinclusion of all types (born global, traditional and born-again global) and size of firmsthat are in different stages of the internationalisation process. Styles and Seymour’s(2006) conceptualisation with the inclusion of entrepreneurial intentions highlightssome key concepts related to the IE domain, such as identification of opportunity,value exchange, human action, learning, creativity and innovation. Also, this enablesus to look at pre-founding stage of the firm, which is now considered as an importantaspect of understanding the internationalisation process of the firm (Arenius et al.2005; Evald et al. 2011; Prashantham and Dhanaraj 2010; Rialp-Criado et al. 2010).

Towards an integrative model of IE

The IE domain is a much broader concept than it was first conceptualised twodecades ago and a distinct field of study now focuses on entrepreneurial internation-alisation. Hence, developing an integrative framework is a challenging task given thenature and complexity of cross-border activities. However, IE scholars made anoteworthy attempt to develop integrative models depicting the core concepts andconstructs in the entrepreneurial internationalisation process (Zahra and George 2002;Jones and Coviello 2005; Madsen and Servais 1997; Bell et al. 2003; Li et al. 2004;Oviatt and McDougall 2005a; Weerawardena et al. 2007; Gassmann and Keupp2007; Rialp and Rialp 2007; Dib et al. 2010). Although, these models have greatlyenhanced our knowledge about the constructs related to IE process, we see anopportunity to extend their work by accentuating the time-dependent, co-evolvingand integrative nature of firm resources, networks and the entrepreneurial behaviourleading to sustainable competitive advantage of the firm. Taking this view, wepropose an integrative model that focuses on five fundamental constructs related toIE field: entrepreneur, firm, networks, environment and competitive advantage.

We are interested in understanding the international entrepreneurial behaviour thatleads to competitive advantage of the firm. Therefore, by establishing the entrepre-neur or the entrepreneurial team as a focal point in the internationalisation process, wehighlight opportunity identification, evaluation and exploitation as integral parts in IEprocess. As such, rather than focusing on the firm-level characteristics, we first needto identify ‘opportunity’ as the unit of analysis (Chandra et al. 2012). We need toidentify the entrepreneurial factors that lead to the opportunity-identification processsince opportunities are identified and exploited by individuals and not firms (Shaneand Venkataraman 2000). Second, we need to understand how entrepreneurs evaluateand exploit these opportunities to gain competitive advantage in internationalmarkets.

Opportunity identification is an intentional process and intentions are consideredas a strong predictor of planned behaviour (Krueger et al. 2000). Strategy scholarsequate intentions to goals of agents and of founding entrepreneurs (Katz and Gartner1988). We found strong support from the IE literature with regard to the positiveeffect of managerial vision and intention (see Table 9) on firm internationalisation.Therefore, we start our framework with the entrepreneurial ‘intentions’ (Bird 1988;Ajzen 1991). However, we postulate that it is influenced and driven by a complex anddynamic process of inter-connected variables consisting of four levels (entrepreneur,



firm, networks and environment).We see the firm as a bundle of resources (tangibleand intangible) that is static in nature without human intervention and the wholeprocess is embedded in the external environment context.

Drawing on previous IE and entrepreneurship literature and building on the workof Ardichvili et al. (2003), we conceptualise entrepreneur/team-related variables thatcontribute to entrepreneurial resourcefulness: first, we suggest that prior knowledgeand experience, self-efficacy, creativity and perseverance (perceived ability to over-come adverse circumstance (Stoltz 1997), represent higher-order cognitive andbehavioural constructs. Second, we suggest that entrepreneurial learning entrepre-neurial knowledge and entrepreneurial capabilities represent the entrepreneur’sdynamic capabilities. Both of these are needed to integrate and combine resourcesfor opportunity identification and exploitation leading to value innovation and sus-tainable competitive advantage of the firm (Kim and Mauborgne 2004; Prahalad andRamaswamy 2004).

Entrepreneurial capacities, such as self-efficacy, creativity and prior knowledge actas antecedents to opportunity identification (Ardichvili et al. 2003). Entrepreneurswho persevere, act proactively (Fillis and Rentschler 2010) and show endurance andresilience in the face of setbacks discover new ways to achieve their goals (Baron andShane 2004). However, these conditions are necessary but not sufficient to identifyand exploit value-innovating international opportunities. Entrepreneurs need to haveaccess to resources through internal (firm) and external environment (social networks,institutions, industry and markets).

According to the RBT, existing firms are endowed with idiosyncratic resources,such as financial, physical, human and organisational capital. Even for entrepreneur-ial new venture creation, one must have access to these resources. Social capital isanother valuable, rare and inimitable external resource capable of providingprivileged access to information (Nahapiet and Ghoshal 1998), and it connectsexternal resources embedded in networks to firm-level resources. An entrepreneur’sSC can derive from both internal (individuals within the firm) and external (socialnetworks that lie outside the firm boundary) (Yli-Renko et al. 2002).

These resources are inherently idiosyncratic to the entrepreneurial firm, but firmsdo not have superior performance because they have access to superior resources.Therefore, the ability of the entrepreneurs to identify opportunities and to exploitthem by combining and re-combining the resources to create value, demands certainentrepreneurial capabilities. First, entrepreneurs must have the ability to learn in theface of changing environment coping with uncertainty. According to Minniti andBygrave (2001), entrepreneurs acquire knowledge through direct experience (specificknowledge such as technical) and by direct observation (learning by doing). We use‘entrepreneurial learning’ (acquire and assimilate resources and organise newlyformed knowledge through experiential and observational learning), (Holcomb etal. 2009) as our first construct in the entrepreneurial capabilities.

Entrepreneurship scholars perceive knowledge as a competency that is importantin three ways: (1) any discovery of opportunity is knowledge, (2) knowledge assistsadditional discoveries and valuations and fit assessments of opportunities and (3)knowledge supports the development of capabilities that support exploitation of

I.K. Peiris et al.


opportunities (Markman 2006). IE scholars perceive ‘knowledge’ as a key valueadding resource of a firm and treat knowledge as a central enabling and drivingresource (Yli-Renko et al. 2002). However, there is no clear consensus about whattype of knowledge and the roles they play in regards to entrepreneurial internation-alisation process. Based on the seminal work of Katz (1974) and related work in theentrepreneurship, IE and IB domains (Johanson and Vahlne 1977; Eriksson et al.1997; Yli-Renko and Autio 1998; Rasmussan et al. 2001; Blomstermo et al. 2004;Mejri and Umemoto 2010), we develop the entrepreneurial knowledge construct andview it as the entrepreneur’s/team’s explicit (theoretical) and implicit (practical/experiential) newly formed knowledge about the technical, conceptual (knowledgeabout markets, industries, consumers, political and economic forces and generalmanagement activities of the organisation) and social elements (knowledge pertainingto resources embedded in individuals, networks and institutions).

Drawing on the DC perspective, we propose a third construct focusing on theindividual/team level to capture entrepreneurial capabilities. It is the ability or thecapacity to build, adapt, integrate and reconfigure resources and knowledge to senseand shape opportunities (Teece 2007). This consists of: technical capabilities (abilityand proficiency in performing a specific task, activity, procedure, process or atechnique), conceptual capability (ability to identify and adapt to market trends,industry changes, quickly evaluate and modify organisational functions, plans andstrategies) (Katz 1974) and social capabilities (leveraging internal external relation-ships by leading, motivating and networking with outsiders, adapt to social situations,ability to read others accurately, make favourable first impressions, ability to identifyresource complementarities and proactively co-ordinate resources in networks)(Baron and Markman 2000; Markman 2006; Mort and Weerawardena 2006; Agndaland Chetty 2007; Tolstoy and Agndal 2010).

The co-evolving nature of knowledge and capabilities must be facilitated byentrepreneurial learning as indicated in the previous section. As such, entrepreneursidentify new opportunities by learning, generating new knowledge and using theircapabilities to identify new opportunities to reconfigure the firm, network, environ-mental and entrepreneurial resources to match the requirements of a changingenvironment (Kogut and Zander 1992). This process of management of resources isthe main way in which firms create value for customers. Entrepreneurship scholarslink innovation and value creation to entrepreneurial activity, though it may takeplace inside organisations. As such, the opportunity exploitation involves a decisionto act on the value creating activities of the firm.

The concept of value has always been at the centre of marketing and strategicmanagement. However, the strategic management literature has primarily focused onbarriers to industry competition, generic strategies and firms’ value chains, payinglittle attention to consumer perspectives (Lepak et al. 2007). According to Lepak et al.(2007), value creation involves innovation that establishes or increases the consum-er’s valuation of the benefits of consumption. Based on this assumption, we focus onthe nexus of opportunity and value innovation by integrating strategic entrepreneurialactions that lead to value innovation. We refer to the work of Kim and Mauborgne(2004) and use four strategic action drivers: eliminate (eliminating factors that



companies and industry have taken for granted even though they no longer addvalue), reduce (reducing the cost structure as against competitors), raise (raising thecurrent standards well above the industry standard) and create (offer entirely newsources of value for buyers by creating new demand and shifting the strategic pricingof the industry). In essence, firms achieve superior value creation by simultaneouslyimplementing cost leadership and differentiation strategies. Therefore, entrepreneur-ial opportunities may be identified in relation to any one or more of these actiondrivers in order to create value for its customers.

Finally, the moderate impact of external environment is taken into account at everystage of the framework. We assert that the entire process of international opportunityidentification and exploitation is embedded in the external environmental context andmust be interpreted with reference to the industry, market and competitive forces.This relationship is depicted in Fig. 2.

Understanding the boundary of IE activities

The IE field is no longer limited to researching the behaviour of INVs. It isexpanding into the study of large and older firms, demanding the need toextend the IE boundaries to capture the dynamics of these firms. The firstmatrix model depicting the four typologies of INVs developed by Oviatt andMcDougall’s (1994) focused on the level of integration of value chain activity acrossmultiple countries and the scope (number of countries involved). Since this develop-ment, IE scholars have extended the same line of thinking by focusing on the differentstages of BG (Hashai and Almor 2004); new venture resource combination and cross

Environmental factors(industry, market, competition,

culture & institutional)

Intention

Firm resources

FinancialPhysical Human

Organizational

Ent. resources

Prior knowledge Creativity

Self-efficacy Perseverance

Social capital

Internal External

Ent. learning

Experiential Observational

Ent. knowledge

TechnicalConceptual

Social

Ent. Capabilities

ability to build, adapt, integrate and reconfigure

resources & knowledge

IOD*

Competitive advantage

Value innovation (eliminate, reduce, raise, create)

Intl. performance

Extent/Scope/Speed/GrowthProfitability/Survival

Fig. 2 An integrative model of IE. IOD* international opportunity development, Ent entrepreneurial, Intinternational

I.K. Peiris et al.


border opportunity identification (Di Gregorio et al. 2008); and simplifying the Oviattand McDougall’s (1994) classification by using the percentage of foreign sales tototal sales, instead of value chain activities to classify the four typologies (Baum et al.2011b). Independent of this development, using a network approach, Johanson andMattson (1988), proposed a broader classification based on the degree of internation-alisation of the firm by identifying four types of internationalising firms: early starter,late starter and lonely international and international among others. However, thesematrix models or classifications did not capture a critical factor in understanding theprocessual nature of the internationalisation process, i.e. ‘time’.

The concept of ‘time’ in international process is essential to capture thetime-based dynamics of internationalisation (Freeman et al. 2010; Jones andCoviello 2005; Sharma and Blomstermo 2003a). The internationalisation process ispath-dependent and involves gradual/rapid knowledge and resource development anddeployment of the firm. Therefore, the concept of ‘time’ is essential to understand thedistinctive behaviour of new and mature firms and the speed of internationalisation.This not only facilitates clarity in defining the IE boundaries but also allows theresearchers to expand their scope of study to use rich insights from IB (integration ofprocess theories) and other management disciplines identified in this paper.

Based on the above two dimensions: the degree of internationalisation of the firmand time, we propose four typologies of firms that can be researched under the IEtheme. They are: BG, enduring global (EG), early exporter (EE) and mature exporter(ME).

First, in order to operationalise the four typologies, we need to identify a thresholdfor the degree of internationalisation and time dimensions to differentiate the BG firmfrom the others. There is a strong empirical support for the BG phenomenon in theinternational entrepreneurship literature. BGs are capable of generating significantvalue innovation activities in international markets (Knight and Cavusgil 2004;Rennie 1993; Melén and Nordman 2009). They have distinct characteristics such asfaster internationalisation, higher foreign sales to total sales ratio and are highlyinnovative, entering diversified markets using multiple entry methods to exploitmarket opportunities. However, the conceptual development of BG firms has beensubstantially hampered by the way BGs have been defined (Chandra et al. 2012).There is still no commonly accepted BG attributes in the IE literature. Widelyaccepted definitions consider a firm as BG when it enters into international marketswithin 3 years of its inception using a quite arbitrary figure of 25 % (with a range of5–75 %) of foreign sales to total sales (FSTS) ratio (Zhang et al. 2009; Knight andCavusgil 2004; Hashai and Almor 2004; Tuppura et al. 2008; Melén and Nordman2009; Nordman and Melen 2008).

However, the 25 % threshold is also applicable to majority of firms that havesignificant domestic market involvement rather than international markets. If weconsider the first BG conceptualisation developed by Rennie (1993), BG firms wereidentified as having an average FSTS of 76 % compared with traditional firms.Furthermore, our analysis of empirical studies in this literature review revealed thatthe BG firms showing an average FSTS ratio of >70 % within the first 3 years ofoperation (Moen and Servais 2002; Chetty and Cambell-Hunt 2004; Gabrielsson and



Kirpalani 2004; Rialp et al. 2005b; Kuivalainen et al. 2007b; Evers 2010). In order toidentify the distinct multinational characteristics of BG firms, a change in thecurrently accepted FSTS levels is timely. If we turn to the IB literature, to determinethe MNEs degree of internationalisation, IB scholars employ 70 % threshold based onWrigley/Rumelt’s strategic product and market differentiation categories (Grant andJammine 1988; Michael Geringer et al. 1989; Vachani 1991). However, using anypercentage to determine the threshold is arbitrary, but for empirical testing to deter-mine high and low levels of FSTS of the BG phenomenon, we see significant merit inusing a 70 % FSTS in future studies.

The second important factor is about the BG entry timing. There aredifferent time frames used in the literature spanning from 2 to 15 years (Dibet al. 2010). Like the export intensity threshold, scholars have used arbitrarymeasures to determine the time span between firm inception and its first internationalsale. Entrepreneurship scholars have used 6- and 10-year thresholds to determine thenew firm survival stage (Audretsch 1991; Shepherd 1999; Brush and Vanderwerf1992). Based on this, IE scholars have used a 6-year threshold to identify ‘new firms’(Shrader et al. 2000; Zahra et al. 2000; McDougall et al. 2003; Hallback and Larimo2007; Prashantham and Dhanaraj 2010; Evers and O’Gorman 2011; Chandra et al.2012). Therefore, the 6-year period to distinguish a new firm from a mature firmprovides a meaningful measurement to draw the time boundary of a BG firm.

Once the thresholds are established to identify BG as a distinct category, we cannext identify other three categories using these two dimensions (see Fig. 3). Oursecond category is called ‘EG’. It is similar to BG firm in terms of degree ofinternationalisation (>70 % FSTS) but has survived the initial phase of internation-alisation (>6 years). The EG firm has exhibits the maturity in operations, with accessto more resources, knowledge and continuity of value innovating activities. In thisphase, we can identify the BG firm’s survival patterns and factors leading to theirsuccessful survival. Using the FSTS as the initial identifier, scholars can furtherexpand this measurement to include ‘related’ (expansion into relatively homogenouscluster of countries/products) and ‘unrelated’ (expansion into heterogeneous geo-graphic regions/products) international geographic and product diversification(Vachani 1991) to identify the scope of BG and EG firms.

The third category ‘EE’ depicts a firm with low FSTS (<70 %) but hasinitiated some activity in the international markets from the inception

Born Global

(BG)

Enduring Global

(EG)

Early Exporter

(EE)

Mature Exporter

(ME)

Degree

ofinternationalization

High

Low

Young Mature

Time Fig. 3 Typology of IE ventures

I.K. Peiris et al.


(<6 years). The EE firm’s primary focus is the domestic market, but it activelysearches for international opportunities in physically close countries because ofthe limited, prior experience (entrepreneurs/teams knowledge and experiencebefore the venture formation), knowledge about international markets, productofferings and network connections.

The fourth and final category ‘ME’ (<70 % FSTS and >6 years) depicts afirm with a higher level of international involvement than the EE firm, as aresult of their long-term exposure to the international markets. However, com-pared with the EG firm, the EE firm lags behind on the basis of market andproduct differentiation with relatively low-value innovation capability in theinternational market. Their internationalisation path is gradual and heavilydependent on the success of domestic market activities. This categorisationaligns with the process view of internationalisation and also considers the vitalrole played by ‘time’ element (Jones and Coviello 2005). It further enables theresearchers to identify the factors that lead to a firm’s transition between each of thesecategories, such as why a BG firm becomes a EG or falls to the level of a ME. It mayalso help explain why the EE will suddenly become an EG (explaining the born againglobal behaviour (Bell et al. 2001) or continue with the domestic market focus (ME).Figure 3 depicts the matrix model illustrating the four typologies.

Conclusions

The IE field has been described as being phenomenally based, potentially fragmentedand suffering from theoretical paucity (Jones et al. 2011). Are we any closer toachieve necessary theoretical rigour in establishing IE as a distinct field of studyafter two decades of empirical and conceptual contributions? In this paper, weattempted to narrow this gap by highlighting the specific theoretical constructsneeded to ground IE research by focusing on the nexus of entrepreneurship, IB andstrategic management. As such, this study emphasised the importance of the integra-tion of IB theories, strategic management (RBT, KBV and DC), entrepreneurship(opportunity identification, cognitive dimensions and effectuation), network (SC) andmarketing theories (customer value creation) in understanding the dynamic process ofentrepreneurial internationalisation.

IE is a global phenomenon. Yet, there are underrepresented regions such as SouthAsia, Middle East, South America and Africa. Scholarly contribution from theseareas would significantly enhance our understanding about the international behav-iour of emerging and developing country entrepreneurial firms. Future studies couldfocus on how traditional agriculture-based industries and low-value addingcommodity-based entrepreneurial firms operate and compete in international markets,how do they innovate and how low-value adding products contribute to the survivalof the firm.

This paper identified different types of resources necessary for entrepreneur-ial opportunity identification and exploitation. It also highlighted the criticalrole played by the entrepreneur/entrepreneurial team in combining and recom-bining these resources to create value innovating outcomes. In addition, whenwe consider a firm as a bundle of resources, the suggested integrative model



provides insights as to how entrepreneurs build and develop these resourcesusing their knowledge, capabilities and learning abilities to identify opportuni-ties to build and reconfigure unique assets. Future studies could focus on therole of firm’s structure, systems and processes in maximising the value creationaspect from an effectuation logic perspective.

SC research is still merging both in network studies and in the IE literature. Thisgives the IE scholars the opportunity to clearly distinguish firm level (structures andprocesses) and interpersonal (formal and informal) resources embedded in networkrelationships and their dynamic nature from a cross-broader perspective. Like oppor-tunity identification, relationships are developed by individuals and not firms. Assuch, we need to understand what makes the firm central in these interpersonalnetwork relationships by examining the network life cycle of the firm and itsinternational co-evolution with the focal firm.

Unlike large organisations with structural rigidities and decentralised decisionmaking, IE research primarily focuses on independently owned entrepreneurialventures and entrepreneurially driven corporate ventures that exhibit dynamicmanagement and decision making styles. We believe by focusing on theconcept of value innovation, IE scholars could capture this dynamic valuecreation process not only from the innovation perspective but also from a costminimisation and from efficiency building perspectives by understanding theentire business process and customer interfaces.

In order to capture the dynamic nature of entrepreneurial behaviour, the integrativeframework is built on three key elements: (1) entrepreneurial intentions, (2) interna-tional opportunity identification and (3) customer value creation. The suggestedmodel shows the antecedents of these elements and their interactions. We hope thatthe conceptual model developed will be tested empirically in the future and encour-age others to refine it further.

The introduction of the four typologies of firms that can be researched under the IEtheme takes the focus away from BG venture creation and extends the research focusto their survival. Furthermore, it broadens our understanding about BG internation-alisation and also draws our attention to domestically focused traditional firms thatenter into international markets gradually and their possible development paths. Thispaves the way for looking at possible trajectories these four types of firms could takealong internationalisation process.

This study is not without limitations. We do not intend this to be an exhaustive listof constructs but a synthesis of accumulated IE knowledge that will lay a robustfoundation to future research. Our initial intention was to offer a complete picture ofcurrent status of IE and develop a way forward. However, in trying to fit in so muchinformation into a limited space may have contributed to the omission of someaspects that need to be covered in more detail such as the constructs in the model.We also excluded books and book chapters (Prashantham 2008a; Yeung 2002;Zucchella and Scabini 2007; Bell and Young 1998; Zahra et al. 2004; Etemad2004b) that would have assisted us further in justifying our theoretical developments.We leave that to future scholars.

Acknowledgments The authors gratefully acknowledge the three anonymous reviewers and the editorHamid Etemad for their insights, helpful comments and suggestions in improving this article.

I.K. Peiris et al.


Appendix 1Tab

le11

Theoretical

fram

eworks

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

Total

Internationalbu

siness

21

23

24

85

66

32

22

149

INV

11

33

22

45

62

33

237

Process

21

23

31

11

317

TCE

11

21

16

FDI

11

12

5

OLI

11

2

Networks

12

21

62

38

58

25

449

Socialcapital

11

22

309

Strategicmanagem

ent

12

11

21

41

11

15

RBT

21

11

22

11

36

33

85

21

42

DC

11

21

12

22

12

KBV

11

11

13

13

12

Entrepreneurship

12

42

13

31

22

21

Opp

.1

12

21

23

11

216

Cog

13

11

22

313

EO

11

21

41

42

117

Effectuation

12

25

Marketin

g1

13

22

12

13

12

19

MO

24

17

Organisationallearning

22

12

12

31

14

LO

11

13

Institu

tionaltheory

31

4

Evo

lutio

nary

econom

ics

11

2

Behavioural

theory

11

13

Agencytheory

11

INVinternationalnew

venture,OLIeclecticparadigm

,TCEtransactioncostecon

omics,Opp

opportunity

developm

ent,Cog

cognition,E

Oentrepreneurialo

rientatio

n,MO

marketin

gorientation,

LO

learning

orientation



Appendix 2: List of authors

Acedo and Florin (2006)Acedo and Jones (2007)Agndal and Chetty (2007)Agndal et al. (2008)Al-Laham and Souitaris (2008)Andersen and Buvik (2002)Anderson et al. (2004)Andersson (2000, 2004, 2011)Andersson and Wictor (2003)Arenius et al. (2005)Armario et al. (2008)Arranz and De Arroyabe (2009)Aspelund et al. (2007)Autio (2005)Autio et al. (2011)Autio et al. (2000)Axinn and Matthyssens (2002)Baker et al. (2005)Barkema and Drogendijk (2007)Baum et al. (2011a, b)Bausch and Krist (2007)Bell (1995)Bell et al. (2001)Bell et al. (2003)Bell et al. (2004)Blesa et al. (2008)Blomstermo et al. (2004)Bloodgood et al. (1996)Boter and Holmquist (1996)Brettel et al. (2009)Brouthers and Nakos (2005)Brouthers et al. (2009)Burgel and Murray (2000)Burpitt and Rondinelli (2000)Butler et al. (2010)Buttriss and Wilkinson (2006)Cadogan et al. (2009)Calof and Beamish (1995)Cassiman and Golovko (2010)Chandra and Coviello (2010)Chandra et al. (2009)Chandra et al. (2012)Che Senik et al. (2011)Cheng and Yu (2008)Chetty and Agndal (2007, 2008)

I.K. Peiris et al.


Chetty and Cambell-Hunt (2003a, b, 2004)Chetty and Holm (2000)Chetty and Stangl (2010)Chiao et al. (2006)Clercq et al. (2005)Collinson and Houlden (2005)Coombs et al. (2009)Coviello (2006)Coviello and Cox (2006)Coviello and Jones (2004)Coviello and Martin (1999)Coviello and Munro (1995, 1997)Crick (2009, 2011)Crick and Spence (2005)Dana et al. (2008)De Chiara and Minguzzi (2002)Di Gregorio et al. (2008)Dib et al. (2010)Dimitratos and Jones (2005)Dimitratos et al. (2004)Dimitratos and Plakoyiannaki (2003)Dimitratos et al. (2010, 2011)Ellis (2011)Eren-Erdogmus et al. (2010)Eriksson et al. (1997, 2000)Etemad (2004a, b, c)Etemad and Lee (2003)Etemad et al. (2010)Etemad and Wright (1999, 2003)Evald et al. (2011)Evangelista (2005)Evers (2011, 2010)Evers and Knight (2008)Evers and O’Gorman (2011)Fan and Phan (2007)Fernandez and Nieto (2006)Fernhaber et al. (2007, 2008)Filatotchev et al. (2009)Fillis (2004)Fink et al. (2008)Fletcher (2001, 2008)Fletcher and Prashantham (2011)Forsgren (2002)Freeman and Cavusgil (2007)Freeman et al. (2006, 2010)Frishammar and Andersson (2009)Fryges (2009)



Gabrielsson (2005)Gabrielsson and Gabrielsson (2011)Gabrielsson and Kirpalani (2004) Gabrielsson et al. (2008)Gabrielsson and Pelkonen (2008)Gankema et al. (2000)Gassmann and Keupp (2007)Gemser et al. (2004)Gilbert et al. (2006)Hadley and Wilson (2003)Hallback and Larimo (2007)Han (2006)Harms and Schiele (2012)Harris and Wheeler (2005)Hohenthal (2006)Hughes et al. (2010)Hurmerinta-PeltomÄki (2003)Hutchinson et al. (2005)Ibeh (2003)Ireland et al. (2001)Jantunen et al. (2008, 2005)Johanson and Vahlne (2003, 2006, 2009)Jones et al. (2011)Jones (1999)Jones and Coviello (2005)Julian (2003)Julien and Ramangalahy (2003)Kalantaridis (2004)Karagozoglu and Lindell (1998)Karra et al. (2008)Keen and Wu (2011)Keupp and Gassmann (2009)Kiss and Danis (2008, 2010)Knight (2000)Knight and Cavusgil (2004)Knudsen and Madsen (2002)Kocak and Abimbola 2009Kontinen and Ojala (2010, 2011)Kropp et al. (2006)Kuemmerle (2002)Kuhlmeier and Knight (2010)Kuivalainen et al. (2007a, b, 2010)Kuivalainen and Sundqvist (2007)Kundu and Katz (2003)Lamb and Liesch (2002)Leonidou (2004)Li et al. (2004)Liu et al. (2008)

I.K. Peiris et al.


Loane (2005)Loane and Bell (2006)Lopez et al. (2008)Lu and Beamish (2001, 2006)Lu et al. (2010)Madsen and Servais (1997)Majocchi and Zucchella (2003)Malhotra and Hinings (2009)Malhotra et al. (2003)Martin and Papadopoulos (2007)Mathews and Zander (2007)McAuley (1999)McDougall and Oviatt (1996, 2000)McDougall et al. (2003)McDougall et al. (1994)McNaughton (2003)Mejri and Umemoto (2010)Melén and Nordman (2009)Michailova and Wilson (2008)Moen (2002)Moen and Servais (2002)Mort et al. (2012)Mort and Weerawardena (2006)Mostafa et al. (2005)Mtigwe (2006)Mudambi and Zahra (2007)Musteen et al. (2010)Muzychenko (2008)Nordman and Melen (2008)Nummela et al. (2005; 2004)Nummela and Welch (2006)O’Cass and Weerawardena (2009)Ojala (2009)Oviatt and McDougall (1994, 1995, 2005a, b)Pajunen and Maunula (2008)Pangarkar (2008)Papadopoulos and Martín Martín (2010)Peng (2001)Perks and Hughes (2008)Pinho and Martins (2010)Pla-Barber and Escribá-Esteve (2006)Pope (2002)Prange and Verdier (2011)Prashantham (2005)Prashantham (2008b)Prashantham and Dhanaraj (2010)Prashantham and Young (2011)



Rennie (1993)Reuber and Fischer (1997, 2002)Rialp and Rialp (2007)Rialp et al. (2005a, b)Rialp-Criado et al. (2010)Ripollés and Blesa (2012)Ripollés-Meliá et al. (2007)Robson et al. (2009)Ruokonen et al. (2008)Ruzzier et al. (2006, 2007a, b)Sainio et al. (2011)Santos and García (2011)Sapienza et al. (2006)Sasi and Arenius (2008)Schweizer et al. (2010)Schwens and Kabst (2009a, b, 2011)Servais et al. (2007)Sharma and Blomstermo (2003a, b)Shaw and Darroch (2004)Shrader et al. (2000)Solberg and Durrieu (2006)Sommer (2010)Spence and Crick (2006)Spence et al. (2011)Steen and Liesch (2007)Styles and Seymour (2006)Szyliowicz and Galvin (2010)Tan et al. (2007)Taylor and Jack (2012)Thai and Chong (2008)Thomas and Mueller (2000)Tolstoy (2010)Tolstoy and Agndal (2010)Tuppura et al. (2008)Turan and Kara (2007)Turcan (2011)Vila and Kuster (2008)Weerawardena et al. (2007)Welch and Welch (2004, 2009)Wennberg and Holmquist (2008)Westhead et al. (2001)Wickramasekera and Oczkowski (2004, 2006)Williams (2011)Wolff and Pett (2000)Wright et al. (2007)Wright and Dana (2003)Yamakawa et al. (2008)

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Yip et al. (2000)Yli-Renko et al. (2002)Young et al. (2003)Zafarullah et al. (1997)(Zahra 2005, 2003)Zahra and Hayton (2008)Zahra et al. (2000)Zahra et al. (2005)Zahra et al. (2007)Zain and Ng (2006)Zarei et al. (2011)Zettinig and Bensonrea (2008)Zhang and Dodgson (2007)Zhang et al. (2009)Zhou (2007)Zhou et al. (2007)Zhou et al. (2010)Zucchella et al. (2007)

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