The Impact of Export Assistance on “Born Globals”: An Integrative Network Perspective

“Born global” (BG) firms have attracted many researchers throughout the last decade. Despite the emergence of BG phenomenon initially posed a serious challenge to the validity and applicability of traditional “stage” theory of internationalization, recently scholars have discovered the theoretical underpinnings of BG firms into the traditional theory. Therefore, recurring attempts at integrating both theories into a single framework have been observed in recent times. Recapitulating the common aspects between the two theories, this chapter seeks to do the same in the study of export assistance and performance by the inclusion of network theory. Network relationship in this chapter has been measured in terms of export assistance and support received by the focal firm from different network actors. Unfortunately, export assistance being an older research stream has largely ignored the role of such assistance in rapid internationalization of BG firms. Moreover, most of the existing empirical literature on export assistance is skewed toward developed countries, thereby little is actually known about the export support systems in developing countries. We address these research gaps by empirically testing an integrative model in a developing country low-tech industry context which explains how network relationships in terms of export assistance received from network actors directly or indirectly influence BGs’ internationalization.