Title: Entry mode of emerging MNCs and the companies' level of technological intensity

Authors: Silvia Novaes Zilber; Eva Stal; Mauricio Massao Oura; Evandro Luiz Lopes

Addresses: Uninove University, Av. Francisco Matarazzo, 612, zip 05001100, São Paulo, Brazil ' FMU University, R. Taguá, 150, São Paulo, zip 01508-010, Brazil ' Uninove University, Av. Francisco Matarazzo, 612, zip 05001100, São Paulo, Brazil ' Uninove University, Av. Francisco Matarazzo, 612, zip 05001100, São Paulo, Brazil

Abstract: The objective of this study was to identify the first entry mode choice of MNCs from an emerging country into a foreign country, as well as the destination countries chosen, based on the companies' level of technological intensity, in an effort to better understand the role of innovation in the process of emerging countries companies' internationalisation. The emerging country selected was Brazil, because there are many studies examining the entry mode of firms from emerging countries such as China and India in other countries, while there are few quantitative studies on this subject for Brazilian companies. A database of 189 multinational Brazilian firms was created and a quantitative analysis was employed with descriptive and univariate statistics through chi-square (χ²) tests in order to test the hypotheses, identifying possible differences between companies with lower or higher technological intensity with regard to their first entry in foreign countries. The results show that the main entry mode used by these companies, from all technological intensities, was greenfield in both emerging countries (49.74%) and developed countries (41.79%). Segments with distinct technological intensities do not appear to have different behaviours with regard to the choice of entry mode.

Keywords: entry mode; emerging multinationals; innovation; technological intensity; multinational corporations; MNCs; emerging economies; Brazil.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBG.2016.076814

International Journal of Business and Globalisation, 2016 Vol.16 No.4, pp.448 - 470

Received: 02 Mar 2015
Accepted: 02 Apr 2015
Published online: 01 Jun 2016 *

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