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The purpose of this paper is to explore international market development for mature products and practices used in a novel business context.

Taking a qualitative approach, the case study method was chosen to investigate how firms develop markets in relation to a new international business context. Critical international decisions are analysed using a managerial perspective.

The success of international ventures depends on managerial learning and effectiveness. In this paper, the authors argue that decisions about international market development can add significantly to the understanding of how business firms enter and develop markets in novel business contexts. Two case studies show different approaches for meeting challenges in distant markets. Four propositions are developed.

A theoretical contribution of this study is the importance of factors that explain international market development decisions in novel business contexts. The balance between incomplete knowledge and making resource commitments is of central concern to international managers. Some of this is tacit knowledge that a firm achieves and learns during the process of market development and other knowledge can only become available after an actual market entry. A second theoretical contribution of this study is the significance of contextual market knowledge in a novel business context.

The purpose of the present study is to examine the general and travel-specific job exhaustion of international business travelers (IBTs). The study employs a JD-R model to explain general and travel-specific job exhaustion (IBTExh) through international business travel as demand and leadership (LMX) as a resource buffering the demands of international business travel.

The study was conducted among Finnish service company employees who had taken at least one international business trip during the previous year. The data (N = 569), collected in 2015, were analyzed with path models.

The results suggest that a higher number of international business travel days is related to a higher level of job exhaustion, especially the exhaustion related to international business travel. Moreover, a high-quality LMX was found to be linked to lower levels of both types of exhaustion. Interestingly, for those IBTs' with a low-quality LMX, even a high number of long-haul international business travel days was not connected with IBTExh

The contribution of our study is threefold. First, this study contributes to JD-R theory and the ill-health process by focusing on a job-specific well-being indicator, IBTExh, in addition to general exhaustion. Second, specific job demands related to international business travel, particularly the duration of business travel spent in short-haul and long-haul destinations, contributes to the literature on global mobility. This study sheds light on the potential effects on IBTs of different types of business travel. Third, our study contributes to the leadership literature and the importance of acknowledging the context in which LMX occurs.

This paper presents a theorization and an empirical analysis of the influences of international open innovation (IOI) on the international market success of emerging market small and medium-sized enterprises (ESMEs). An analysis of the moderating roles played by cross-cultural competencies and digital alliance capabilities in this specific context is also presented.

The study adopted a quantitative research design involving a survey of 231 ESMEs based in the UAE. The authors formulated some hypotheses and tested them by employing hierarchical regression models.

The findings revealed that IOI positively affects the international market success of ESMEs. The authors further found that both cross-cultural competencies and digital alliance capabilities moderate the relationship between IOI and international market success.

The study advances the international marketing, knowledge and innovation management literature in two ways. First, it is a pioneering study that advances both the theoretical and empirical scholarship regarding the relationship between IOI and emerging market firm international market success by employing an extended resource-based view. Second, it further highlights the role played by cross-cultural competencies and digital alliance capabilities as effective governance mechanisms that moderate the relationship between IOI and international market success.

The purpose of this paper is to engage in a comprehensive review of the research on information technology (IT)-mediated international market-entry alliances.

This paper provides a theory-informed conceptual framework of IT-enabled cross-border interfirm relationships and performance outcomes. It integrates perspectives of resource-based view (RBV) and transaction cost economics (TCE) to argue that the establishment of interfirm IT capabilities enhances the marketing performance of the foreign partner in the host location by improving interfirm relationship governance. Furthermore, IT-related risks and contextual restrictions are identified as important moderators.

Conceptualisations of IT capabilities, IT-enhanced interfirm governance, and IT-led marketing performance improvement are suggested. Drawing on RBV and TCE, IT resources, related human resources, and IT integration between partner firms in combination enhances the ability of firms to manage the relationship more effectively through shared control, interfirm coordination, cross-firm formalisation, and hybrid centralisation. These benefits then bring about better upstream and downstream marketing performance in the host location. Additionally, IT capabilities help to mitigate possible contextual limitations and risks.

The paper offers a number of theory- and literature-informed research propositions which can be empirically tested in future studies.

Top managers of firms currently in or planning to enter international alliances for market entry should carefully consider effective development of interfirm IT capabilities in terms of readiness of hardware and software, human resources, and organisational resources.

The paper provides an integrated framework and propositions which contribute to limited understanding and appreciation of IT value in international market-entry alliances.

The purpose of this study is to critically review the book Islamic Law and International Law by Emilila Powell.

The book review is undertaken from a comparative legal and political science perspective, including arguments and insights from international relations, international law, Islamic law, Islamic culture, religious studies, legal history and European as well as international political history.

While the empirical part of Powell’s work (chapters 5, 6 and 7) shows a methodologically veryc well done approach and at the same time highly interesting insights, both foundation and context show several critical points, in particular, a lack of differentiation with respect to the Western politico-legal tradition, its concepts and the resulting implications.

The book represents an excellent starting point that should inspire new, more intensive as well as exhaustive research on this topic.

The book generates valuable insights for practitioners such as judges at international courts dealing with issues involving so-called Islamic law states, as well as politicians or public service officials in the context of international law and international politics.

As the paper is a comprehensive review of the book based upon comparatively based insights from international relations, international law, Islamic law, Islamic culture, religious studies, legal history and European as well as international political history, the arguments of Powell are analyzed and commented upon in a comprehensive, well-founded and fair way. This should give potential readers a good understanding of Powell’s arguments, inspire a critical lecture of the book and contribute to the important discourse on the connex between international law and Islamic law.

The purpose of this study is to, first, analyze the past years of research on international branding and, second, building on an early literature review, to analyze patterns in the field and suggest future research.

The analyzed papers were compiled using the Web of Science and Scopus databases. The author searched papers published between 2007 and 2023 that used terms related to international branding in their title, abstract and keywords.

This paper structures and identifies key institutions, papers, regions and authors in the field. It provides an overview of the past years of research in the area. The study identifies important gaps in the literature and suggests further research dealing with, for example, the B2B sector and emerging markets.

Despite the increase in international branding studies, few literature reviews have been published since 2007. This review fills this research gap. It identifies future research areas dealing with branding in the B2B sector, branding in emerging markets, branding process and implementation studies using longitudinal methods and more practical research.

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.

This study aims to increase understanding of factors influencing the international marketing (IM) strategy of products from emerging markets (EMs) to international markets.

This study conducted case studies by collecting qualitative data through semistructured interviews with respondents from four food product companies in Bangladesh.

This study finds that the firms employ local Bangladeshi people who are knowledgeable in the company culture. They strategically focus on countries where the Bangladeshi diaspora lives and initially target them, approaching natives later. They adapt and customize products to the importers’ requirements to make them visible and increase understanding between product providers and local customers. The findings show that EM firms encounter a mentality that poor countries produce poor quality products; this mindset makes the internationalization of their business difficult.

This research contributes to international product marketing of EM firms by constructing a model of a modern people-oriented marketing strategy for food products. This study contributes to literature on culture by illustrating that the cultural dimensions of collectivism and uncertainty avoidance enhance the development of networks and trust and impact marketing strategy.

This study theorizes the importance of context and an innovation-driven modern people-oriented IM strategy that adapts to customers’ preferences for food products and emphasizes the contribution of diaspora. This research reveals that Bangladeshi firms face challenges both because customers link the country and the companies to low-quality products and because governmental regulations prevent them from establishing a local presence in other countries. This study analyzes challenges EM firms face in the process of IM and the factors affecting Bangladesh in particular.

The objective of this paper is to increase understanding of social media in international business context. To this end, the authors make an attempt to integrate the existing, still somewhat limited views in a framework that advances the knowledge of scholars and decision-makers on this topic.

The authors conduct a conceptual study supported by use of a systematic literature review method.

This study shows marketing as a dominant area of discussion and reveals that many firm functions where social media plays a role have received relatively little attention. Furthermore, the study shows that the positive features of social media in international activity tend to be more widely acknowledged and better understood than the potentially problematic aspects.

The number of articles analyzed in this study was relatively small, resonating with the nature of an emerging research area. Research on social media has only taken off over the last years, and it is understandable that there is limited research that connects it specifically to phenomena of international business.

This study reminds managers to be cautious when using social media in international markets. The relationship between social media and international business exhibits dynamism and is dependent on a variety of factors. Social media does not come without costs, nor is easily transferred from one market to another. Efficient use of this media in the international context may increase the need of specific and qualified human resources, and it may necessitate having the whole process from R&D to delivery, and beyond, ready for adaptation.

It can be argued that we know too little about the relevant factors and relationships between social media and international business. The authors hope that this study revealing the scarcely studied aspects and suggesting a tentative framework for capturing the dynamics of social media and international business can guide subsequent research and accelerate its emergence.

Managerial discourses tend to portray work-related mobility practices in a positive light, presenting mobility assignments as a place of stimulus and differentiation. A conception of mobility as an opportunity, may contrast, in specific economies and business settings, with lived personal experiences. This article reports the results of a three-year study, aimed to question how multinational companies (MNCs) located in a small and developing European economy (Portugal) are building talent pools for expatriate assignments. Interaction effects, as proposed by the job demands-resources (JD-R) theory, are considered as lens to understand the interplay of company expatriate policies, willingness profiles and psychological contracts of expatriates. By using a Portuguese sample, the study examines whether prior findings in mature economies and consolidated MNCs can be generalized to less developed international business settings.

A three-year study, encompassing 24 expatriate cases observed in five multinational firms born or located in Portugal. Two techniques of empirical data collection were used: statistical sources and documental analysis and in-depth interviews. A total of 37 interviews were conducted, both in-person and remotely, of which 13 were with company managers and representatives, and 24 with expatriates (as defined and referred like this by the companies under study).

Heterogeneous company policies, ranging from juvenile, functionalist to more dynamic and flow-based approaches, are presented as qualifying resources of willingness levels and psychological contracts of expatriates. Observed interaction effects between policies, willingness and psychological contracts, empirically mirrored in three profiles (conformist, protean and disrupted expatriates) suggest that incentive effects (emanating from company policies) and job demand-resource balance, factored as terms of social and economic trade, are non-linear and asymmetric, influencing firm propensity to succeed while using international work to support company expansion goals. As job resources, expatriate policies are presented as operating as pull or push factors: functionalist HR approaches seem to act as push factors generating more conformist or compelled willingness profiles.

Generalization of study's outcomes has limitations. Future studies are encouraged to use comparative and longitudinal research designs. Furthermore, future research should include business expatriates with entry-level positions, and increase the number of interviewees, as results can also be considered as limited by sample size.

It is suggested that further strategic work is needed to present expatriation development value, formally screen and consider willingness level as selection criteria, and enlarge the pool (from internal to external) of candidates, in peripheral economic settings such as Portugal. A shift to more dynamic and job resource-dense policies are suggested as beneficial, as pathway to optimize social and economic value from expatriation assignments and work experiences.

By putting the interplay between macro and micro-level processes into perspective, the study provides empirical evidence on how company expatriate policies have come to promote unforeseen differentiation of employee willingness and psychological contracts at the heart of MNCs. This is particularly relevant in developing economies such as Portugal, challenging the need to build talent pools for international work assignments. Empirical data illustrating company policies interactive effects with different willingness profiles and psychological contracts of expatriates is provided.