Marco Economic Contributions by International New Ventures, a literature review

Traditionally, multinational corporations are viewed as large established companies, mostly founded in the second half of the 19th century. These multinational enterprises have shaped the economy the last century, and globalized word markets. Their process of internationalization was considered to be a slow one, as successful penetration across borders should only be achievable after successful penetration of the domestic market (Johanson and Vahlne, 1977). The increased importance of new ventures in international business recent decades has seriously challenged this stage theory in international economics. In a pursuit to explain this development, especially researchers in entrepreneurship have recently published numerous papers and research on this topic. Additional research on INVs is needed to get a broader and deeper understanding of how INVs benefit the economy. For scientists it is important to investigate INVs in particular as it is a relatively new field of research, and current literature cannot fully explain its functioning. Furthermore, as INVs are assumed to stimulate economic growth by the generating spillovers, and increasing innovation in the economy. Therefore, a better understanding of INVs is useful for governments, so they can tailor their policies to stimulate new ventures’ international expansion. In this thesis, a selection of these papers will be discussed with the purpose of explaining how some of these researchers came to conclude that international new ventures (INVs) contribute more to economic growth than domestic new ventures (DNVs) do. Furthermore, the thesis contains a review of already existing literature in this field, together with a review of some empirical studies conducted. Below, the research question together with 5 partial questions supporting the central research question are listed.