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Globalization has opened up new markets. Companies have now endless opportunities to expand their business reachwith sportsclubs being no exception. Internationalization in sports has its beginnings with foreign players joining a team and changed in 1995 with the Bosman ruling. After the Bosman ruling, the transfer of international players became easier. Not only can one notice the internationalization of sports teams by the transfer of players but also by the expansion of the sports itself. The NFL plays home games in London, the NBA in Mexico City and FC Bayern Munich has opened subsidiaries in the US and China. Yet, this all seems like the whole sports industry is expanding. However, the influences behind this drive are unclear. The purpose of this thesis is to gain an understanding of internationalization in the sports industry. As the current literature indicates several gaps regarding the internationalization of sports clubs such as the limited view on one sport at the time or the data usage of clubs in their internationalization process, this thesis focuses on offering a broaderpicture. Therefore, the research question formulated for this thesis is:What influences the internationalization in the sports industry?For answering the research questions and fulfill the purpose of this thesis, an inductive approach was selected with a qualitative exploratory research study. By mixing the pur-posive and self-selected sampling, six semi-structured interviews were conductedamong different sports clubs. The findings indicate that there are several different influences in the internationalization process of sports clubs. Leagues and their ambitions are one direct influence. Here, the leagues statutes seem to be guidelines forthe clubs and their perspec-tives on growing. Another influence are the market conditions, where one can distinguish between the home market and foreign market conditions. There are some markets that do not allow much for further grow, as another sport is dominating the industry. For that reason, expanding internationally becomes necessary. Yet, some clubs see more potential on the home market to expand their scope and are thus, not thinking of internationalizing soon. Also influencing the internationalization are partnerships. Partnerships, either new or existing ones, offer the benefit of having knowledge or a business network the club can potentially benefit from. This study contributes to the literature of sports teams’ internationalization by adding the underlying concept of influences in the process. Understanding the influences will not only support the eventual internationalization but also offers the opportunity to unite or-ganizations in their efforts.

Technology has transformed the world, especially the business market; it is the cause of disruption for many industries that had to adapt to this new generation and develop new ways of doing business and expanding their knowledge. As a consequence, a new internationalization theory was developed to explain companies' behaviors related with international commerce: the born-global model. Born-globals are companies that direct their sells to the international market right from the start, they do not focus in a single market and do not follow a step-by-step internationalization. This model is normally used by small and medium companies that do not have many resources and therefore opt by using the internet as their most valuable resource to reach their target market. The present case study reflects a Portuguese successful case of born-global: the shoes brand "Josefinas", founded in 2011. Filipa Júlio was inspired by her grandmother Josefina, the person who took her to ballet classes when she was little and made her life an adventure. Since the beginning the brand opted for selling its products exclusively online as it does not require a great amount of investment and has the advantage to have a constant feedback of what customers want. This case will, therefore, focus on the critical success factors of "Josefinas", the analysis of how the brand is integrated in the luxury footwear industry, how the characteristics of a team contribute to the success of a brand and, finally, how technology impacts this type of companies. A tecnologia transformou o Mundo e, em particular, o mundo dos negócios; é causa de disrupção em muitas indústrias que tiveram de se adaptar a esta nova geração e desenvolver novas formas de negócio e expandir os seus conhecimentos. Como consequência, um novo modelo de internacionalização foi desenvolvido para explicar o comportamento das empresas relativamente ao comércio internacional: o modelo "Born-global". As "born-globals" são empresas que dirigem as suas vendas para o mercado internacional desde a sua criação, não se focando apenas num único mercado e não seguindo, por isso, uma internacionalização por fases. Este modelo é geralmente usado por pequenas e médias empresas que não possuem muitos recursos e optam, assim, por utilizar a internet como o seu recurso mais importante para ter acesso ao seu mercado-alvo. O presente caso de estudo reflete um caso português de sucesso de uma "born-global": a marca de sapatos "Josefinas", fundada em 2011. Filipa Júlio inspirou-se na sua avó Josefina, a pessoa que a levava às aulas de ballet quando era criança e que sempre tornou a sua vida uma aventura, para criar a marca. Desde a sua criação que a marca escolheu vender os seus produtos apenas online, uma vez que não requer um grande investimento e possui a vantagem de ter um feedback constante das clientes. Este caso irá, assim, focar-se nos fatores críticos de sucesso das "Josefinas", na análise da integração da marca na indústria de sapatos de luxo, em como as características da equipa contribuem para o sucesso da marca e, finalmente, no impacto que a tecnologia tem neste tipo de empresas.

Fashion is one of retailing’s most actively internationalizing sectors. Relatively little is known about the diverse aspects of fashion brand internationalization, despite unprecedented levels of activity in this area for the past two decades. This introductory chapter reviews the characteristics of the fashion industry, the main differences between manufacturing internationalization and retailing internationalization, and traditional approaches to internationalization. Major trends in fashion brand internationalization are also introduced, including: the increased internationalization of Asian apparel brands; the increase in international outshopping both online and offline; the acquisition of leading global fashion brands by companies in developing countries; and Chinese influences on fashion brand development. The opportunities and challenges for global apparel brand companies created by this changing environment are discussed.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are the most dynamic part of economy and have a significant impact on the economic development of every country. Growth and development, even survival of a company whose domestic market is small - as it is the case with Croatia, is not possible without internationalization. Basic problems of SMEs are a lack of resources and high perceived risk of doing business abroad due to numerous entry barriers. Limited knowledge regarding doing business abroad and regarding the ways of applying theory in practice, indicates a need for creating simple guidelines that will help SMEs to face the complexity of internationalization and reduce the perceived risk. In this paper, the authors reviewed models of internationalization of enterprises with the aim of developing guidelines to facilitate the internationalization of Croatian SMEs. The theoretical part provides a framework which is the basis of the proposed guidelines for the internationalization of SMEs. The framework includes company’s generic strategies and internationalization, barriers to internationalization, methods of selecting foreign markets, market entry strategies, a discussion on standardization and adaptation, and models of internationalization. The empirical part consists of a case study of a small Croatian company that has an innovative and highly competitive export product and presents the internationalization of that company based on the proposed guidelines. It also provides practical steps to all SMEs having intention to internationalize their operations.

This paper makes several contributions to the emerging literature on the post-entry behavior of international new ventures. Based on an extensive longitudinal data set, we investigate the dynamics of commitment, growth and survival of different types of newly internationalizing Belgian firms. Global start-ups have the highest initial and rapidly rising export commitment per market and are also more likely to continue exporting over time than geographically focused start-ups, and traditional staged exporters. However, global start-ups also display the highest failure rate. This high failure rate appears to result primarily fromthe ‘liability of newness’ and less from the added complexity associated with rapid and wide scope internationalization. publisher: Elsevier articletitle: International commitment, post-entry growth and survival of international new ventures journaltitle: Journal of Business Venturing articlelink: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusvent.2013.01.001 content_type: article copyright: Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. ispartof: Journal of Business Venturing vol:29 issue:1 pages:101-120 status: published

In our master thesis “Fashionable strategies” we analyze the internationalization processof small and medium sized Nordic Fashion companies. In our study we conducted aquantitative survey and qualitative in-depths interviews to shed light on the topic. We usehereby an iterative research strategy through the triangulation analysis method as researchapproach. The combination of methodologies and perspectives allowed us to analyze ourtheoretical framework and the research questions in a favorable manner. The researchquestions we aim to investigate in our study were the following:· What are the reasons for the small and medium sized Nordic fashion companies wheninternationalizing, and what are the strategies the companies use hereby?· What influences the small and medium sized Nordic fashion companies in their choiceof strategy and market to enter?· Which barriers of entry and problems do the small and medium sized Nordic fashioncompanies see as critical in their internationalization process and how do theyovercome these issues?In the research we especially took a look at the following areas that we found mainlyimportant for fashion companies in their internationalization process: The reasons forexpanding, the choice of market, the entry modes that are used and barriers and problemsthat occur in the process. We take a view on the theoretical models of the Uppsala Model,Helsinki model, Revised Uppsala model and Born-Global Theory to explain the strategiesbehind the small and medium sized Nordic fashion companies.We see that the growth of the company and the profit increase are the main reasons for theNordic fashion companies when expanding their business. The entry modes used by thecompanies are agents and distributors, and when choosing the markets the fashioncompanies are contact-driven and focusing first on markets that have a rather smallerdistance to their own domestic market. The problems the companies have to overcome arecosts of entry, cash-flow and invoice payments which are all related to financial issues.We believe that our study has contributed with new information to the research field ofinternationalization concerning small medium fashion companies in the Nordic countries.

The 21st century would be a nightmare for Don Quijote: thousands of windmills are installed all over the globe and the number will increase tremendously over the next years. If climate change was an issue in the early 17th century, Don Quijote might have specialized in fighting nuclear or fossil fuel power plants. The change in power production is clearly pronounced, and it inspires the market to respond immediately. Numerous wind turbine manufacturers emerge, developing one technological innovation after another. The trend clearly goes in one direction: horizontal axis wind turbines in all possible variations. However, there are a few companies that do not follow the mainstream – they swim against the current and introduce new concepts, with the potential to set new standards in the industry. Nevertheless, the question whether these companies can establish operations and survive in an industry dominated by large multinational corporations arises. If these companies want to become recognized, they need to compete on an international scale from the outset – they become born globals. This master’s thesis investigates the preconditions under which an innovative start-up company can become born global in the wind turbine industry. For that, distinctive resources and capabilities of such companies, as well as key success factors for the industry are defined. Furthermore, enhancing or restricting parameters lying within company’s environment – in particular, within its networks – are discovered. These findings are based on and supported by the case study of an innovative vertical axis wind turbine manufacturer. In addition, the influence of this company’s university spin-off origin is investigated.