Resource Acquisition, Internationalization, and the Catch-up Path of Chinese Construction Machinery Champions—The Case of Sany, XCMG, and Zoomlion

This study investigates the internationalization and resource accumulation process of the three largest Chinese construction machinery companies: Sany, XCMG and Zoomlion. It takes a longitudinal approach to analyze the internationalization process of the three companies over the last 25 years. Although the three companies’ paths in the early acquisition of technologies and firm-specific advantages (FSA) differ significantly, however, their internationalization process exhibits similar pattern. They all exploit the same home-country based FSAs in their south-south expansion into other emerging markets, and seem to mimic each other in their strategic moves. In the south-north expansion into advanced economies they skip the export stage and rely almost exclusively on foreign direct investment of both forms, greenfield and M&A, to pursue asset augmenting objectives and overcome their “liability of origin”. The study concludes by discussing several topics of interest, such as the implications of accelerated resource accumulation, the impact on competition with advanced multinationals in the home market or possible effects on the level of state support and risk taking behavior in the internationalization process by the companies’ ownership type.