Chapter 15 Against All Odds – A Diaspora Entrepreneur Developing Russian and Central Asian Markets

Purpose To understand how diaspora entrepreneurship evolves and becomes a small-scale emerging market multinational and how this process is enabled. Methodology/approach Case study and ethnographic methods were employed. Findings Diaspora entrepreneurs can act as change agents who create and penetrate markets under difficult conditions. They are less influenced by institutional voids in home and host countries when they have strong international diaspora networks that enable a connection to resources, overcoming such voids. Diaspora entrepreneurs may be resource-embedded socially in a way that creates superior competitive advantages and reduces liabilities of foreignness and of outsidership. Research limitations/implications Diaspora entrepreneurship incorporates invisible and idiographic potential, such as social capital and knowledge networks. These are not available for other non-incumbent companies (e.g., foreign entrants) and are difficult to research due to access barriers. Practical implications Perception and active management of network-based resources is important for opportunity and business development. Management in a transition economy context requires holistic views, deep understanding, and working linkages across markets. Social implications Transgenerational entrepreneurship and ethnic traditions are important for the community. Entrepreneurship provides continuity and identity, such as using ethnic language, as well as prosperity and solidarity that are important for supporting cultural identity. Originality/value This study connects diaspora entrepreneurship in Central Asia and emerging market multinationals that are small and medium-sized enterprises. Both are underexplored domains, but may share particular institutional settings. Growth and internationalization into a multinational enterprise with an emerging market origin, especially by women entrepreneurs, are rarely studied. This case illustrates the need to capture the processual dynamics, resources, and actor networks, including sociocultural and spatiotemporal factors for better contextualization.