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Firms in developed nations have practised supply chain management (SCM) for decades, but we ask here if they will be able to progress well under the modern regime of harder and faster e‐just‐in‐time systems. We assume these to be concentrated mainly in Europe and the USA, but with origins having global outreach – their management must concern themselves with explicit and tacit factors embracing the culture and ethics of people having diverse national origins. Essentially, we will discuss the challenges of knowledge management and organisational learning in the SCM systems that embrace firms located in many countries, Western as well as Asian, which have more (or less) permeable organisational boundaries and who must learn to trust each other regardless of their ethic differences.

This study aims at providing exploratory insights into the initiative and capabilities of Chinese SMEs to develop and utilize diverse networks to support internationalization. Such network development and utilization efforts are fundamental to the analysis and explanation of Chinese firms’ internationalization patterns and outcomes. Extending from the existing network studies in the Chinese context that generally put emphasis on strong‐tie and ethnic‐oriented networks, this paper investigates and explains explicitly the use and effects of both strong‐ and weak‐tie networks in the international development of Chinese SMEs. Indepth case studies on four rapidly internationalized Chinese SMEs are conducted. The case findings demonstrate that weak‐tie networks are essential to the firms’ business development in foreign markets; and were proactively developed and utilized in the course of the firms’ development. The cases also provide alternative perspectives to the beliefs and values underpinning strong‐tie networks presumed in existing literature. The findings draw attention to the changing business values and approaches of the Chinese firms aiming at developing internationally. Managerial implications concerning the significant influence of effective networking on internationalization are pinpointed.