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This perspective article aims to provide an overview of the interplay between international entrepreneurship and the dynamics of family businesses, with a particular focus on post-entry decisions.

This paper is based on a short literature review.

The convergence of international entrepreneurship and family businesses presents a compelling area of study, where post-entry decisions serve as a critical yet underexplored facet. Post-entry decisions in international entrepreneurship for family-owned businesses encompass responses to international crises and shocks and strategies for de-internationalization, restructuring or market exit.

This article synthesizes existing research, highlighting the importance of studying post-entry decisions in the realm of international family businesses. It encourages scholars and practitioners to delve into the unique challenges faced by these firms, ultimately enriching the understanding of international entrepreneurship within the family business context and providing valuable insights for both theory and practice.

Drawing on the time compression diseconomies perspective and business network theory, this study examines how the international expansion of a business group’s pace, scope and rhythm affects its performance.

Panel data (1999–2013) from the top 100 Taiwanese business groups investing in globalization were collected.

The results show that international pace and rhythm have an inverse U-shaped relationship with business group performance, while the relationship between international scope and business group performance is U-shaped. This study highlights that international expansion is multidimensional and nonlinear and that the factors that shape nonlinear relationships between international processes and performance are different. Furthermore, family group involvement positively moderates the link between international scope and performance and negatively affects the relationship between international pace and performance. However, no significant effect is observed between rhythm and performance. High family business group involvement mitigates the impact of outsiders’ liability and managerial costs; moreover, it enhances the positive effects of location-specific advantages and business network resources.

This study combined the time compression diseconomies perspective and business network theory to explain why and how internationalization may not always lead to good performance by examining the effects of different international expansion processes and the interactive effect of family group involvement.

Building on recent developments in the Uppsala model, we first examine the role of business model innovation (BMI) in the internationalization process of firms and then determine to what extent international experience and psychic distance have a moderating effect between BMI and the success of a firm’s international initiatives.

We apply a multiple hierarchical regression model to a sample of 168 firms of two border regions in Italy (Friuli Venezia Giulia) and Austria (Carinthia).

We find empirical support for the moderating role of both psychic distance and international experience in the relationship between business model innovation and the success of internationalization initiatives.

The paper contributes to the evolutionary perspective of the internationalization process of firms by adding new aspects related to the role of business model innovation to the most re-cent developments of the Uppsala model. From an empirical point of view, the paper contributes to the literature by identifying and testing two boundary conditions that shape the relationship between BMI and international success.

Using bibliometric techniques, the author analyzes a dataset of 276 articles on cross-border mergers and acquisitions (CBMAs) published in 13 management and international business journals. The author assesses the scientific impact and visualizes the intellectual landscape of research on CBMAs by analyzing publication and citation data and interconnections between publications. First, the author assesses annual publication trends and identifies highly cited articles and productive journals in the dataset that have significantly contributed to our understanding of CBMAs. Second, the author identifies main themes in recent research on CBMAs by focusing on frequently used keywords in publications. Third, the author identifies clusters of related research and explores their interrelationships to outline emerging trends, new perspectives, and directions for future research on CBMAs. Overall, this chapter contributes to the understanding of CBMAs by documenting the progress made to date and providing important insights for future research.

This study aims to examine the relationship between knowledge management and career development in an era characterized by high levels of youth unemployment and a demand for specialized skills. Despite the increasing transition to a knowledge-based economy, there is a significant gap between young people’s skills and career readiness, necessitating an in-depth analysis of the role of knowledge management at the individual, organizational and national levels.

The authors conducted a qualitative study using the theory-context-characteristics-methodology approach based on a systematic literature review. The authors created an ecological framework for reflecting on knowledge management and career development, arguing for a multidisciplinary approach that invites collaboration across sectors to generate innovative and reliable solutions.

This study presents a comprehensive review of the existing literature and trends, noting the need for more focus on the interplay between knowledge management and career development. It emphasizes the need for businesses to promote the acquisition, storage, diffusion and application of knowledge and its circulation and exchange to create international business human capital.

The findings may help multinational corporations develop managerial training programs and recruitment strategies, given the demand for advanced knowledge-based skills in the modern workspace. The study also discusses the influences of education, experience and job skills on business managers’ performance, guiding the future recruitment of talents.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this review is among the first to assess the triadic relationship between knowledge management, career development and the global unemployment crisis. The proposed multidisciplinary approach seeks to break down existing silos, thus fostering a more comprehensive understanding of how to address these ongoing global concerns.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an integrative picture of the state of the art of the literature on digitalisation of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) as an enabler for their internationalisation process and as a comprehensive view of the specific domains impacted by digital technologies as well as their repercussions on the international outreach.

A systematic review which leverages a descriptive analysis of extant literature and an axial coding technique has been conducted to shed light on the current knowledge and to identify primary research areas and future research lines.

The research indicates that digitalisation impacts the internationalisation of SMEs in three specific domains: (1) internationalisation through the adoption of information and communication technologies (ICT) technologies and e-commerce platforms; (2) international expansion through the digitalisation of value chain activities and (3) international outreach through knowledge acquisition on digital platforms.

The value of this study is threefold. First, the authors attempt to systematically review the literature on SMEs digitalisation and internationalisation and provide a holistic perspective on the intertwining of these two research streams. Second, the authors propose a novel conceptualisation on the dimensions of SMEs digitalisation as enablers to internationalisation. Third, the authors put forward promising future lines of research.

1. Digitalisation represents a pivotal strategy that allows companies to build new strategic capabilities and is a propeller for SMEs internationalisation.

2. Through e-commerce, SMEs could compete at the same level of multinational companies but enduring lower costs of expansion.

3. Digital platforms allow SMEs to enhance the learning processes about international markets through an immediate access to relevant information.

4. Digital entrepreneurship has enabled SMEs to develop new configurations of value chain activities, evolving their business model or reaching new markets.

5. SMEs are changing the “business as usual” paradigm offering digital tools to build modular architectures that are scalable and agile in their evolution ability.

Digitalisation represents a pivotal strategy that allows companies to build new strategic capabilities and is a propeller for SMEs internationalisation.

Through e-commerce, SMEs could compete at the same level of multinational companies but enduring lower costs of expansion.

Digital platforms allow SMEs to enhance the learning processes about international markets through an immediate access to relevant information.

Digital entrepreneurship has enabled SMEs to develop new configurations of value chain activities, evolving their business model or reaching new markets.

SMEs are changing the “business as usual” paradigm offering digital tools to build modular architectures that are scalable and agile in their evolution ability.

Given the contradictory findings of standardization/adaptation of marketing strategy in explaining export performance in the extant research, this study aims to examine the contingent effects of managerial ties and born global orientation in the standardized advertising-export performance conceptualization.

The study used two-respondent method in the survey research by a sample of 155 exporting firms operating in the industrial marketing based in Australia and New Zealand and applied hierarchical regression analysis to test the hypotheses.

The findings demonstrate that standardized advertising has a significant effect on export performance and this relationship is positively moderated by business ties. Such effect is particularly enhanced for born global firms (than nonborn global firms). However, political ties negatively influence the impact of standardized advertising on performance and such effect is stronger for born global firms.

A broader perspective of contingent variables should be included to examine the underlying relationship between standardized advertising and export performance in capturing the dynamism in international marketing contexts, such as institutional frameworks or sociocultural environments in host countries.

Standardized advertising is critical for born global firms’ export performance as it can increase efficiency and speed up internationalization processes. Such positive impact of standardized advertising on export performance is further enhanced if born global firms allocate resources to develop strong business ties with host country partners instead of building political ties with host country governments, because smooth business networking can facilitate standardized advertising on industrial marketing, yet justifiable political relations require intricate negotiations that often prolong internationalization progress.

This study incorporates managerial ties and born global orientation as contingent factors in fixing the theoretic interlock between standardization advertising strategy and export firm performance.

This study has two main objectives. First, to examine the indirect effects of digital platform capability and digital resilience on digital transformation (DT) outcomes for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and second, to investigate how digital business model maturity influences these indirect effects.

The study adopts a quantitative design and collects data through a self-reporting survey from individuals in the technological industries. The Partial Least Squares-Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) and PLS multi-group analysis examine the measurement and structural models and the significance of differences in indirect paths based on the digital business model maturity level, serving as a moderator.

The findings of this study provide valuable insights into the internationalisation of digital SMEs. They indicate that digital platform capability and resilience fully mediate, connecting digital resources to SME growth. The study also confirms the digital business model maturity’s positive and significant moderating effect on these indirect relationships.

This research contributes to the existing literature by focusing on the international outcomes of platform ecosystems in developing markets. It explores how digital platform capability and resilience support the digital transformation of SMEs, considering their vulnerability due to their small size. The study also fills a research gap by investigating the relationship between big data, digital leadership and the international growth of digital platforms. Lastly, it explores the role of digital maturity in the relationships between antecedents, determinants and outcomes of digitalisation.

Businesses are increasingly called upon to support the improvement of society and the environment, and one way to do so is by expanding into international markets, particularly through exports. Despite the importance and recognised challenges of a global approach to sustainable value creation, sustainability research tends to focus on domestic contexts. This paper aims to identify the boundary conditions linking sustainable value creation practices with firm performance in the international context.

The authors merge the sustainable value creation and the international marketing literature to develop two propositions that capture the emerging nature of the field and the lack of concluding evidence regarding the link between international sustainable value creation practices and firm performance. The authors test these propositions empirically by analysing 519 responses to a survey of exporting firms in Portugal, using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis.

The authors identify seven configurations that support sustainable value creation in an international context. These consist of varying levels of standardised and tailored offers, management experience and competitive intensity.

The identification of seven different configurations helps managers decide whether and how to innovate when pursuing sustainable value creation opportunities in international markets.

The authors propose that an effective way for governments to achieve national and transnational social and environmental agendas is to help businesses that pursue sustainable value creation to succeed in international markets. Given that four of the seven pathways to improve export performance that the authors identified require international management experience, the authors posit that an effective way to support the internationalisation of those businesses is through targeted training programmes and knowledge-sharing initiatives.

The authors respond to calls for research to integrate the sustainable value creation and the international marketing literatures, to identify how and when firms can create sustainable value creation in an international context and thus support the resolution of global, social and environmental problems. The finding that there are multiple configurations that support this goal explains why empirical evidence collected thus far is inconclusive and helps identify the boundary conditions of existing theory.