Role of Networks in Emergence of International New Ventures

The present paper combines network approach-based internationalisation research and entrepreneurial opportunity discovery research to examine the entrepreneurial networking for emergence of international new ventures. Specifically, we aim to find out how entrepreneurs use relationships to create a basis for emergence of an international new venture. In the empirical part, we conduct a single case study on the process of emergence of a venture that operates in software business serving the so-called continental system developers. The primary empirical data consists of interviews of the entrepreneur and interviews of the persons in the networks on which the emergence of the international new venture was to a great extent based. As a result, we present a process model of international new venture emergence. It illustrates the acts of opportunity creation that are embedded in entrepreneurial networks. The networking acts are taken to a great extent before firm establishment and centre on overcoming the dual hurdle created by the lack of capability and lack of legitimacy