Born Globals (BGs): Who Are They?

Abstract

The acceptance and recognition of born global firms (BGs) as relevant and singular organizations across the world’s economy has been flourishing in the recent years. Born globals are commonly entrepreneurial and relatively young small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), with limited resources. Although these restrictions and constraints, BGs initiate their internationalization process from early stages. Thus, they conduct their internationalization process more rapidly than traditional firms operating in domestic markets and using incremental processes. Nevertheless, theories on BGs are still not fully developed by researchers. Few studies have tried to advance theoretical reflections on born global firms and their internationalization. This paper examines how research on BGs internationalization has emerged and its development over time. Furthermore, it identifies the challenges faced by these firms when they internationalize and gives future research suggestions to academicians for the advance of the research in the internationalization of born global firms.

Keywords: SMEs, Internationalization, Born globals, Early internationalization