Reconceptualizing International Entrepreneurship (IE)

Abstract

New changes after the pioneer works in Oviatt & McDougall (2005b) and Oviatt & McDougall (2005) suggest that we have now entered Phase II of internationalization, featuring an “IE Capitalism” with three stylized facts: The birth of INVs by MNEs through global value chains; the accelerated marketization through e-commerce platforms, and international commitment based on expected returns. The first fact provides the human agency to IE; the second drives up, enlarges and empowers accelerated internationalization to make it popular, efficient and long lasting; the last fact links INVs and Non-INVs, suppliers and consumers and short- and long-term outcomes. With a unified IE concept we no longer need separate concepts of IE and INV; with accelerated marketization the rules of entrepreneurial game have been changed and we can no longer just look at firms but ecosystems; Finally with expected returns it is no longer sufficient to rely on firms unique assets to gain and to maintain sustainable competitive advantages.