Past, ongoing, and future debate on the interplay between internationalization and digitalization
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Past, ongoing, and future debate on the interplay between internationalization and digitalization Mara Bergamaschi1 · Cristina Bettinelli1 · Elena Lissana1 · Pasquale Massimo Picone2 Accepted: 29 October 2020 © The Author(s) 2020
Abstract The interplay between internationalization and digitalization (IDI) is a relatively young research domain that is finding its way into numerous academic journals, which motivates us to systematically portray the proceedings and evolutions of this interplay over time, analyze its methodological and theoretical background and, more importantly, provide insights to guide future research on these phenomena. Combining qualitative and quantitative approaches, we analyze 68 peer-reviewed international business and management papers to explore the structure of knowledge production and identify the emerging trends. Our research reveals four key stages of the debate: (a) how IDI influences interorganizational aspects (1996–2004), (b) how digitalization influences the balance between perceived risk and returns in internationalization (2005–2009), (c) how digital advances and available internationalization channel alternatives influence IDI (2010–2014), and (d) how IDI influences intraorganizational aspects (2015–2019). Moreover, our analysis reveals heterogeneity across theoretical perspectives, methods, and research themes over the years. Finally, we identify theoretical and methodological challenges related to IDI research. Keywords Internationalization strategy · Digital innovation · Digitization · International business · Information technology · Literature review
1 Introduction In recent decades, management studies have acknowledged digital transformation (or digitization; i.e., the “technical process of converting analog signals into digital form”; Legner et al. 2017, p. 301) as one of the most relevant phenomena shaping the evolution of the business world and, by and large, societies * Mara Bergamaschi [email protected] Extended author information available on the last page of the article
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(Parviainen et al. 2017; Tihinen et al. 2016). Correspondingly, scholars have paid attention to the “sociotechnical phenomena and processes of adopting and using [digital] technologies” (Legner et al. 2017, p. 301), namely, firms’ digitalization. The common ground of such studies is that digitalization is changing how firms orchestrate their resources and interact with one another (Luz Martín-Peña et al. 2018; Parviainen et al. 2017). At the same time, the international business literature has revealed that firms’ are increasingly making decisions to sell their products in many countries and meet multiple market demands or move, partially or entirely, production abroad (Grant 2016). Correspondingly, scholars have attempted to disentangle the antecedents (with a special focus on transactions, resources, locations, and institutions; Cuervo-Cazurra et al. 2018, 2019; Matysiak and Bausch 2012) and consequences (Kirca et al. 2012) of this inter
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