Scandinavian Working Papers in Business Administration

Working Papers,
Copenhagen Business School, Department of International Economics and Management

No 7-2002: THE INTERNET AND FOREIGN MARKET EXPANSION BY FIRMS

Bent Petersen, Lawrence S. Welch and Peter Liesch
Additional contact information
Bent Petersen: Department of International Economics and Management, Copenhagen Business School, Postal: Department of International Economics and Management, Copenhagen Business School, Howitzvej 60, 2nd floor , DK-2200 Copenhagen N, Denmark
Lawrence S. Welch: Mt. Eliza Business School, Postal: Mt Eliza Business School, , Melbourne, , Australia.
Peter Liesch: University of Queensland, Postal: Graduate School of Management, , University of Queensland,, Australia.

Abstract: The Internet has the potential to improve the efficiency of market transactions. By use of the Internet companies can reduce their search costs significantly and increase their ability to respond flexible to new market opportunities as a result of reduced sunk costs. On the basis of internationalization theory and agency/transaction cost theory the paper examines the effects of the Internet on foreign market expansion by firms. These theoretical issues and possible effects on internationalization are illustrated through the presentation of three general predictions regarding possible outcomes. The predictions demonstrate that a range of foreign expansion effects of the Internet is likely: from limited impact to rapid, widespread global expansion in many cases. The Internet may contain a challenge to mainstream internationalization theory in regard to the role of knowledge: instead of acting as an initial constraint it may be a factor that propels firms into foreign market expansion.

Keywords: Internet; Market transactions; Internationalization; market expansions

28 pages, July 1, 2002

Full text files

6565 PDF-file 

Download statistics

Questions (including download problems) about the papers in this series should be directed to Lars Nondal ()
Report other problems with accessing this service to Sune Karlsson ().

This page generated on 2024-02-05 17:10:05.