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Reports that, with sluggish growth in the developed markets of the world and increasing globalization, companies are turning to newly emerging markets for business expansion. Therefore, understanding entry strategies in emerging markets is likely to become an increasingly important issue for academic researchers and marketing practitioners. First movers are generally thought to garner fairly robust advantages over later entrants; however, the degree to which these advantages prevail in emerging markets is not known. Examines, by means of a literature review, the effects of emerging market conditions on first mover advantages. Advances several research propositions, based on the findings, presents a conceptual model, and identifies directions for further research.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the first-mover decision as one decision of a set of strategic decisions that ultimately determine performance.

The author used survey data collected from foreign-invested firms in Sichuan, China, to test for evidence that first-movers perform better than late-movers.

The results reveal that there is a first-mover advantage when the other strategic variables are not included in the model. When the entire set of strategic variables is included, however, the first mover variable loses its significance and the willingness of the foreign partner to commit additional resources becomes the best predictor of performance. Consequently, it was argued that foreign investment strategies should be analyzed as a set of strategic decisions managers make to formulate the best mix.

The empirical evidence for the first-mover advantage may not be as well grounded as many have thought. When the first-mover strategic decision is analyzed in isolation from other strategic variables, which is commonly done in many empirical studies, it indicates that firms that enter China before their competitors perform better. Unfortunately, it is more logical to assume that managers dynamically develop a set of strategic decisions that ultimately determine the firm’s performance. To extrapolate one static decision from the strategic decision set and make broad assertions about its effect of performance is an over-simplification of the strategic decision process.

In environmental policy first mover advantages for environmental technologies are often taken for granted. It is a popular view to see the state as a political entrepreneur who introduces a certain environmental policy instrument and thus becomes the world market leader or the lead market for the respective technology. Against this background, the purpose of this paper is to find out if the idea of first mover and lead market advantages can be justified by theories and empirical evidence.

A wide range of theoretical and empirical papers from the business management and industrial economics literature were reviewed to provide success factors for different timing‐to‐market and lead market strategies of environmental innovations.

A successful innovator is not necessarily the first but very often one of the early movers within the competition of different innovation designs. The paper shows that the success of a timing strategy depends on country‐specific lead market potentials, on market and technology characteristics and on the regime of the country‐specific regulation. On this basis the paper derives options for environmental innovation strategies for firms under different circumstances of markets, technologies and regulations.

Patent applications, R&D expenditure, etc. are not unimportant input factors for the innovation, but all these supply‐side factors are beyond the focus of this article.

Research on the lead market and the timing to market takes centre stage when product innovations are in the development phase. Companies in countries that do not have sufficient above‐average lead market attributes must target product innovations to fit the preferences of users in the lead market.

This paper is the first to analyse if different timing to market advantages and lead market advantages for environmental innovation can be justified by theories and by empirical evidence.

The purpose of this paper is to explore whether being a first‐mover into the Chinese market through strategic alliance with host companies provides competitive advantages to the foreign entrant. The aim is to understand the relevance of the first‐mover and internationalization process (incremental learning) for competitive advantage in China during environmental uncertainty. Thus, the author proposes that the first‐mover (foreign firm) would be able to deflect environmental uncertainty, such as the economic recession of 2008, by forming an alliance with Chinese enterprises earlier than its rivals.

Quantitative methods for data analysis were used in support of the proposition. The sample comprises 187 foreign multinational enterprises that entered into the Chinese market through strategic alliance with local partners. The dependent variable is return on assets (ROA) of the firm. The author used the timeline as the independent variable. The longer duration implies earlier entrants on the temporal scale. The author also used several controlled variables at the firm level, industry level and national level of the home country. The analysis was based on ordinary regression.

The result supports the main hypothesis in favour of the first‐mover advantage. Apart from the main effects in the hypotheses, there are some interesting alternative effects captured in the control variables. It appears that age of the firm tends to hamper firm performance. Industrial discretion is another control variable. The author predicted a positive coefficient. However, the result is not significant. The result shows competitive forces can lead to a better performance for the first‐mover. This observation is counterintuitive because monopoly is the source of performance, and competition reduces monopoly. It should be negatively correlated, but the result shows the opposite. In this sense, competition appears to be contributing to the firm's performance. A possible reason is that firms compete in the downstream of the industrial value china in established industries. Hence, the first‐mover advantage supports the early entrant in competitive conditions. Licensing mode of governance is negative. In comparison to alternative modes of governance, it appears that contractual mode such as licensing is less conducive for better performance. Firms that entered into IBA in China after her membership with WTO performed lower than those entered before WTO. Home country's R&D spending has not shown significant and positive influence on the performance.

The author proposes that cultural distance needs to be included in the research and analysis for a better understanding on the phenomenon of first‐mover advantage. Second, the research needs to be replicated in other contextual settings. China is indeed a big market. However, there are multiple different institutional systems in the world. Third, it will be interesting to identify the late‐mover's advantage so that policy decisions can be made in comparative terms.

This paper is different and novel in two ways. First, it reveals that companies that had entered into Chinese markets were able to deflect some of the losses caused by the global slowdown. It means that internationalization can be both positive and negative. It is negative because global crisis can adversely affect almost all economies. However, it can be positive when some economies are stable, and the firm has entered into that stable market earlier than others. Second, the research reveals that cultural and institutional distance can be a positive source during an economic crisis. The author can see today (in 2012) that similar economies of the west are still struggling to get out of the recession of 2008.

An experimental design is used to examine the effect of products’ country‐of‐origin on first‐mover advantage. Specifically, focuses on the effects of favorable/unfavorable country‐of‐origin on first‐mover advantage, as well as its effects with regard to “early followers” and “late followers”. The results have direct implications for products entering international markets as a first mover, “early” follower, or “late” follower. Results indicate that with increasing number of competitors entering an international market, a product’s favorable country image begins to lose its strategic importance. Consequently, the pursuit of first‐mover advantage may be more relevant than a positive country‐of‐origin effect. Also, the results suggest that for products from countries with a less than favorable image, it may be more useful to be a “follower” than a “first‐mover” because the advantage of being first in a market can be negated by the unfavorable country‐of‐origin effect.

This paper aims to present a new framework that describes the relationship among market entry order and timing, the advantages accruing to first-movers and late-movers, entry timing premium (ETP), marketing strategy and enduring market performance of the firms. The framework, empirically tested using data from 241 business executives, expands extant research into new territory beyond first- and late-mover advantages in an attempt to reconcile a few streams of research in the area and provides an entry related, strategic assessment tool (ETP) for the managers. Contribution to marketing strategy theory and managerial implications are also presented.

Participants included informants in a firm’s strategic business unit who were the most familiar with a new product’s commercial launch, market condition at launch, competitor offerings, marketing activities and capabilities and eventual integration into or withdrawal from the product’s portfolio. Therefore, for the survey, the study targeted chief executive officers, vice presidents of marketing or sales, product or sales managers, general managers and regional managers. Both preference bias (Narus, 1984) and survivor biases among the respondents were addressed.

The research result of this study reveals two very significant aspects of marketing and marketing strategies. First, the importance of financial, pricing and cost strategies further attests to the fiercely competitive nature of the global market today and the tendency for firms to commoditize most products and services. An effective financial and pricing strategy, coupled with a higher level of ETP, is capable of leading a firm to initial market success in the product-market in which it competes. Both ETP (a positional advantage and resource of the firm) and financial and pricing strategies (a deliberate strategic decision of the management) are important to achieve this goal.

This study is limited in several ways. The effects of entry order and timing on market performance could be dependent on the types of industries and types of product categories involved. However, as the hypotheses were well supported, the “industry specific” factors would provide “fine-tuning” in the future study. Second, the nature of the product (goods or services) may also present varying effects on the relationship studied (for differences between manufacturing and service firms in pioneering advantages, see Song et al., 1999). Services’ intangible nature, difficulty in protecting property rights, high involvement of boundary-spanning employees and customers, high reliance on delivery and quality, and ease of imitation may alter the proposed relationships in the model and the moderating effects. Third, although this study used a “retrospective” protocol approach in the data collection by encouraging respondents to recall market, product and business information, this study is not longitudinal. Lack of longitudinal data in any study involving strategic planning, strategy execution and the long-term effects is no doubt a weakness. In addition, due to peculiarity and complexity with regard to regulation and other aspects in pharmaceutical and other industries, the theory might be limited to a certain extent.

In all, the integrated framework contributes to the understanding of the intricate issues surrounding first-mover advantage, late-mover advantage, entry order and timing and the role of marketing strategy. The framework provides practitioners guidance as to when to enter a product-market to gain advantageous positions and how to maintain that advantage. Firms that use a deliberate late-mover strategy could also benefit from the research finding in mapping out their strategic courses of action.

This study believes that the halo effect surrounding first-mover advantage may have obscured the visions of some researchers and managers, and the pursuit of a silver bullet has led to frenzied interests in becoming a “first-mover” or a deliberate “late-mover”. The theoretical framework, which is substantiated by empirical testing, invalidates the long-held claim that entry of a particular kind (first-movers or late-movers) yields any unique competitive advantage. It is a firms’ careful selection of marketing strategies and careful execution of the strategies through effective operational tactics that would lead to enduring competitive advantage, under an adequate level of ETP.

Using Amazon.com as a case study, the present research explores first mover (dis)advantages in e.commerce. It examines whether or not Amzon.com has sustained early mover advantages. What are these advantages? And how has Amazon.com reacted to late movers? Evidence generated from the case study suggests that the maintainability of first mover advantages in e.commerce depends on three main factors: continuous innovation, speed of implementation and patenting.

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate how firms compete with each other in philanthropic giving in the context of a natural disaster. In particular, the authors want to investigate: Which firms act faster in disaster relief giving? How do late movers react? In the end, which firms donate most at the competitive equilibrium, first or late movers? Whether and how firm visibility will affect the relationships proposed based on the former three questions?

The Chinese listed companies that donated to the May 12, 2008, Sichuan earthquake are taken as a sample. A negative binomial regression analysis is first conducted to identify the first movers. Then, linear regression analysis is conducted to identify the competition between first movers and late movers.

The authors find that large firms and firms with a high financial performance tend to be first movers in disaster relief giving. Late movers donate amounts that are similar to those of first movers in both absolute and relative value. But first movers donate more in absolute value than late movers in the whole process of giving. Firm visibility strengthens the effect of financial performance (return on assets) on giving timing, but weakens the effect of giving timing on both first round and total giving amount.

This study provides a dynamic theory of giving and enhances the understanding of the motives and patterns of corporate disaster relief giving. It also illustrates important insights into firms’ strategic and tactical behavior in disaster relief giving.

This paper aims to find out the factors that influence the choice of dual innovation strategies in the process of knowledge pricing and transaction between first-mover and late-mover companies in an open innovation environment and also to find the key factors that affect the company's strategic choice in factors such as heterogeneous market environment, demand elasticity, exploration risk intellectual property prices and transaction cost.

This study uses the Cournot equilibrium and Stackelberg two-stage master-slave game model to describe the evolutionary process of knowledge pricing in an open innovation environment of first-mover and late-mover companies.

Research shows that in an open innovation environment, the formation of a dual innovation strategy in the pricing process of corporate intellectual property transactions is a complex process. Changes in one-time transaction costs and changes in the inverse demand coefficient of the innovation market play the decisive role in the choice of dual innovation strategies. When the demand of the innovation market is moderate, the inverse demand coefficient of the innovation market and the one-time transaction cost has an inverted U-shaped influence relationship. As the innovation market's inverse demand coefficient and the one-time transaction cost increase at the same time, the degree of differentiation of the enterprise's dual innovation strategy choice gradually reduces; when the one-time transaction cost is the largest, the degree of strategy differentiation is minimized.

Based on the above relationship, suggestions are made to guide enterprises in the knowledge pricing and transaction process in an open innovation environment, promote enterprises to form a dislocation development and complementary advantages in the knowledge innovation ecological chain and improve the overall innovation efficiency of the industry.

Technological innovations can have Important strategic implications for individual companies and can greatly influence industries as a whole. Yet, not all technological change is strategically beneficial. This article focuses on ways to recognize and exploit the competitive significance of change.