A DYNAMIC APPROACH TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF INTERNATIONAL NEW VENTURES

The competitive and organizational behavior of new firms has changed dramatically. Firms do not need to be big to internationalize, International New Ventures (INV) are a reality. But, they are characterized by the liability of newness and the liability of smallness. Since the nineties, scholars have devoted considerable attention to this phenomenon, but no one explains how these companies can overcome these constraints and internationalize. In this context, this paper uses a multilevel analysis, resulting in a more integrative framework. This approach extends the literature including, at the same time, the firm perspective (following the studies developed in Uppsala and the RBV), the organizational network approach and the international entrepreneur perspective. It has three units of observation and one of analysis. To understand INV dynamics it seems very important to observe, study and relate firm with network and entrepreneur. This research finds out that the entrepreneur plays a particularly important role in these new companies, ill-equipped (of relations, resources and knowledge), but the entrepreneur does not act in a vacuum; he is part of a firm integrated in a network. To internationalize early firms must use indirect knowledge, resources and history from organizational networks and from the entrepreneur.