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Emerging markets face the developmental circumstances of a weak foundation in both manufacturing and services. Although servitization is viewed as an opportunity to realise industry transformation and upgrading, ways for emerging market firms to implement a high-level servitization strategy is still understudied. This study examines combinations of causal conditions for emerging market firms to implement a high level of servitization.

Anchored in the strategy tripod model, this study examines the configurations for implementing a high-level servitization strategy by using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) and data from the China Stock Market and Accounting Research Database (CSMAR).

The findings identify three kinds of configurations for achieving a high-level servitization strategy: market-cultivational servitization, competition-driven servitization and government-related servitization. Furthermore, the mechanisms for implementing a high-level servitization strategy differ within the regional marketization level and state-owned equity. Specifically, the improvement of the regional marketization level helps manufacturing firms realise a high level of servitization by strengthening service capacity, and state-owned equity helps firms gain distinctive legitimacy to integrate suppliers and providers into the servitization context.

The proposed multilevel perspective frameworks enable manufacturing firms in emerging markets to achieve a high level of servitization strategy.

This paper explores the impact of institutional environment, industry conditions and firm-level microfoundations on servitization, therefore providing a reference framework for emerging market firms interested in implementing high-level servitization strategies.

This study aims to focus on a key unanswered question about how digitalization and the knowledge processes it enables affect firms’ strategies in the international arena.

The authors conduct a systematic literature review of relevant theoretical and empirical studies covering over 20 years of research (from 2000 to 2023) and including 73 journal papers.

This review allows us to highlight a relationship between firms’ international strategies and the knowledge processes enabled by applying digital technologies. Specifically, the authors discuss the characteristics of patterns of knowledge flows and knowledge processes (their origin, the type of knowledge they carry on and their directionality) as determinants for the emergence of diverse international strategies embraced by single firms or by populations of firms within ecosystems, networks, global value chains or alliances.

Despite digital technologies constituting important antecedents and critical factors for the internationalization process, and international businesses in general, and operating cross borders implies the enactment of highly knowledge-intensive processes, current literature still fails to provide a holistic picture of how firms strategically use what they know and seek out what they do not know in the international environment, using the affordances of digital technologies.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the process of integrating sustainability into the corporate strategy of an emerging market multinational enterprises (EMNE) to achieve and maintain corporate legitimacy over time. The research explores how deploying a corporate sustainability strategy enhances the company’s long-term competitive relevance by creating and maintaining corporate legitimacy and transferring practices based on sustainable development goals within the organization.

The study adopts a qualitative single-case design, focusing on a corporate energy services company (Interconexión Eléctrica S.A.) operating in volatile, uncertain and turbulent environments.

The findings indicate that integrating sustainability into the corporate strategy enables subsidiaries to effectively meet global requirements, considering internal and external pressures. This integration also fosters the development of unique capabilities and the internalization of standards, addressing liabilities in foreign markets, thus providing a competitive advantage and safeguarding corporate legitimacy among stakeholders.

This research contributes to the international business literature by providing insights into strategy development and implementation in EMNEs. Specifically, it demonstrates how a Latin American emerging multinational enterprise (multilatina) adopts new sustainability strategies to enhance its business competitiveness. The study also offers guidance for emerging market companies on developing sustainability strategies and transferring them to subsidiaries operating in complex institutional environments. Furthermore, the research provides a rationale for governments and civil society organizations on why firms are committed to sustainability, highlighting its positive impact on firm’s competitiveness and survival in international markets.

The discussion of competitive strategy in recent years has turned to exploring the differences between emerging market (EM) companies and traditional companies from the US, Europe and Japan. In particular the question has been: do we need a new theory of EM companies, or can existing theory be applied, perhaps with adaptations? The authors intent in this paper is to show what features enable EM firms to succeed in domestic competition, where institutional settings are different from those in Triad countries. The authors do not explore the issue of EM companies competing internationally.

The authors argue that competitive advantages (Porter) or resources (Barney; Wernerfelt) offer a solid base on which to build an understanding of successful domestic strategies of firms in EMs, also recognizing that the specific advantages differ somewhat in EMs, due to institutional differences (Peng). The authors explore characteristics of the 250 largest publicly-traded South African firms which enable them to compete successfully (incl: company size, brand value, company age, international sales and family ownership). The authors conclude that existing theories do indeed serve in this context, but that they need to be adjusted for the different institutional environments in EMs.

Factors that contribute to performance include: company size(+),brand value(+), company age (+), international sales(+) and family ownership(−). The literature that has developed on EM companies competing internationally fails to recognize that most of the features identified exist for all companies in a given country – so they do not explain domestic performance. Of course, even in the domestic context some companies will be better able to take advantage of institutional capabilities such as dealing with the government and with volatile economic conditions than other companies.

The study results come from only one EM, so there may be limits on generalizing to others. If China is excepted, the results here are broadly applicable to medium-sized and larger EMs today, with idiosyncrasies remaining for individual countries (such as natural resources, location, etc.)

EM companies to succeed in their domestic markets should look to build size/scale, to develop their brands and to expand internationally. They should also expand ownership to non-family investors. These factors were significantly correlated with superior performance of listed companies in South Africa and have been shown to apply elsewhere as well.

Also, most analyses of EM companies focus on their distinctive institutional capabilities for competing with firms from Triad countries. The study analysis focuses on domestic competition rather than on going abroad.

This study aims to understand the dynamics underpinning the exit and re-entry strategies adopted by multinational enterprises (MNEs) in an emerging market, Pakistan.

This study undertook an in-depth historical case study of Yamaha Motorcycles, which had initially entered Pakistan as a joint venture but had then exited and re-entered as a wholly owned subsidiary.

This study found that, despite its status as a market leader and one of the older players in the Pakistani market, changing market dynamics in the 2000s – especially the increased competition brought by more affordable (inexpensive) Chinese motorcycles and the weak enforcement of industrial policies – had pushed Yamaha Motorcycles to exit. Another factor that had contributed to its exit were differences in risk perception and strategies with its local joint venture partner (a Pakistani business group). Hence, both firm-level and institutional factors had played significant roles in Yamaha’s market exit. This study further found that re-entering in a wholly owned subsidiary operation mode had been beneficial for the firm, as it gained a significant market share due to its focus on innovation and on capturing a market niche, which had earlier not been its main focus. The findings also suggest that opportunity logics and multiple forms of learning can be important for a firm’s re-entry into a host market – such as experiential (i.e. learning from experience) and vicarious learning (i.e. learning from other organizations, including suppliers and competitors) in an emerging market context, in which institutions evolve amid political and policy uncertainty. Finally, this study found that exit and re-entry timing is an important factor for the development of competitive advantage in a host market.

This study is among the few to have investigated the exit and re-entry strategies of MNEs in emerging markets. The relatively short time during which Yamaha Motorcycles had been out of the market had benefited it on its re-entry, as the firm had been able to capitalize on its prior learning and ties to suppliers’ networks.

International Journal of Emerging Markets (IJoEM) is a leading journal that publishes high-quality research focused on emerging markets. In 2020, IJoEM celebrated its fifteenth anniversary, and the objective of this paper is to conduct a retrospective analysis to commensurate IJoEM's milestone.

Data used in this study were extracted using the Scopus database. Bibliometric analysis, using several indicators, is adopted to reveal the major trends and themes of a journal. Mapping of bibliographic data is carried using VOSviewer.

Study findings indicate that IJoEM has been growing for publications and citations since its inception. Four significant research directions emerged, i.e. consumer behaviour, financial markets, financial institutions and corporate governance and strategic dimensions based on cluster analysis of IJoEM's publications. The identified future research directions are focused on emergent investments opportunities, trends in behavioural finance, emerging role technology-financial companies, changing trends in corporate governance and the rising importance of strategic management in emerging markets.

To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study to conduct a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of IJoEM. The study presents the key themes and trends emerging from a leading journal considered a high-quality research journal for research on emerging markets by academicians, scholars and practitioners.

This study aims to systematically review strategy making in the seaport context during a period of hyper uncertainty.

A systematic review using the context, intervention, method and outcome (CIMO) framework is conducted in the domains of strategy making and the port sector taking account of hyper uncertainty caused by Brexit.

Strategy making (under conditions of hyper uncertainty) is shown to evolve from both stakeholder/supply chain embedded relationships and from chief executive officer and extra organisational inputs. Through an iterative process of internal resourcing, stakeholder engagement strategy development can be seen to impact five key outcomes of an emerging strategy making under hyper uncertainty: economic returns; societal and regional impacts; deeper improved market engagement; improved environmental sensing and potential for dynamic capability development.

The systematic review integrates the existing fragmented research landscape regarding strategy making under hyper uncertainty, provides future research trajectories and develops a framework emerging from the review.

The framework offers port management and policymakers a tool to improve their engagement with strategy making under hyper uncertainty and associated outcomes.

The systematic review consolidates the fragmented literature and presents future research trajectories. The framework of strategy making under hyper uncertainty developed from the CIMO framework develops existing knowledge and contributes to academic theory.

An Indian emerging market positioning taxonomy has been developed in response to the literature review's findings that existing positioning typologies/taxonomies are based on managerial perspectives rather than consumer/customer perceptions and are only developed for advanced countries.

This study employs a three-step process for developing and validating a scale in order to conduct its research. In the first phase, items are generated and selected based on a literature review, focus groups and expert opinion. Exploratory factor analysis is used to fine-tune the scale in the second phase. Phase 3 uses CFA to establish convergent, discriminant and nomological validity through the use of CFA.

A consumer-based taxonomy of positioning strategies were developed as a result of the research. Six distinct positioning strategies emerged that was named (1) Value for Money, (2) Functional (3) Premiumisation, (4) Promotional Campaign, (5) Brand Name (6) Visual Aesthetics.

Developing and validating measurement scales will be made easier with the help of this paper. Target populations, industry and geography selection and a cross-sectional time horizon are just a few of the study's drawbacks.

The study's practical implications include six factors/strategies that managers, advertising executives and marketing experts of consumer electronics companies in the Indian emerging market could use to position their products, resulting in the overall success of their organisations.

This study adds to the marketing literature by providing a solid theoretical foundation and a validated instrument for operationalising positioning strategies.

Leveraging signalling theory and institutional environment theory, this study aims to examine how the entrepreneurial orientation of emerging market firms impacts initial public offering (IPO) performance.

The authors conduct regression analysis based on archival data from 312 firms’ IPOs in India.

The results in the Indian context suggest it differs from IPO performance in developed markets. In an emerging market context, the findings suggest that only competitive aggressiveness is valued by investors in IPOs. The findings further show that proactiveness and autonomy negatively influence IPO underpricing.

The research propositions imply that, owing to institutional voids in emerging markets, investors’ risk propensity and, hence, rewarding a firm’s entrepreneurial orientation differ from those in developed markets.

Extant literature has given limited attention to the dynamics of entrepreneurial orientation and the effect of each dimension of entrepreneurial orientation on IPO performance in emerging markets.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of international expansion of emerging markets multinationals (EMNEs) on the home country nonmarket political strategy and why some EMNEs intensify this political tie more than others.

We test our theoretical framework using longitudinal data, with 16 years of observations, in Multilatinas and state loans from Brazil, one of the main outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) players in the world and the OFDI leader in Latin America.

Theoretically grounded on the institution-based view of strategy, it can be postulated that international expansion is a driver of home country nonmarket political strategy. It can also be hypothesized that political tie intensity is affected by the capacity of EMNEs to deal with international expansion issues without having to depend on relationship with homes country nonmarket political actors. The results provide support for the hypotheses presented.

This paper contributes to the EMNE internationalization literature by extending the understanding of the underlying motivations and forces shaping the home country nonmarket political strategy of multinationals from emerging markets and, thus, helping understand why some EMNEs tend to be more politically active than others. Likewise, the study contributes to advancing understanding regarding the home country strategic responses adopted by Multilatinas and the forces behind the nonmarket political strategies they employ in their international expansions, especially during turbulent times.