Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explain how some born global firms can leverage the rich social capital in their local (home country) horizontal network for accelerated international market entry and growth. Horizontal networks warrant separate attention from their vertical counterparts, which, along with those focussed on external international contexts, dominate most network studies in the realm of born global research. Design/methodology/approach The study utilises a multi-level qualitative approach in the study of a multi-firm population of animators in Ireland that, due to the small domestic market for their product, needed to pursue global customers from inception. The case study domain was purposely selected as a critical exemplar of a local horizontal network operating in a highly globalised industry. The authors collected data through in-depth interviews with 16 company founders. This primary interview data were complemented by interviews with staff at the apposite industry association and triangulated with secondary data on the local and global industry conditions, members’ international successes and awards. Findings The results demonstrate how active membership of a local horizontal network can be leveraged for the acquisition of international market knowledge and customers for born global ventures. This arises from the sharing of collective market knowledge and communal global customer information within the network to mutual benefit. Originality/value Although limited by the specific conditions in this highly globalised, non-competitive industry context, this study is unique in that it finds that cooperative interpersonal and inter-firm relationships embedded in a local horizontal social network, and mediated in part by an institutional support actor, emerge as important levers for a born global’s accelerated acquisition of foreign market knowledge and of global customers.

This paper demonstrates how active membership of a particular form of social horizontal network, in the form of a Community of Practice (CoPs) can bring about the creation and accelerated internati ...

The born global network for rapid internationalization represents a ‘black box’ as is reflected by the limited studies on the importance of intermediary actors and network nodes in their internationalization process. To address this research gap this study contributes to born global network theory in that it investigates the international network for a defined population of Irish indigenous born globals operating in the highly globalized digital animation industry. Given the small domestic market and breadth of global product sourcing within this industry, the indigenous Irish digital animation firms must, from inception, quickly access customers in the international arena if they wish to survive and prosper. This chapter addresses two research questions: (1) how do network intermediaries influence the internationalization of born globals in the digital animation industry? (2) How do network nodes influence the internationalization process of born globals in the digital animation industry? The study takes a ‘microscopic view’ into the network mechanics in the born global network, intermediary by intermediary, node by node, to open the black box of the born global network and identify the elements that compose the network and plug the structural holes between producer and buyer in the digital animation global marketplace. It finds that the principal intermediaries in the digital animators’ international network are institutional bodies such as the government enterprise agency and, even more so, the national industry trade association and the entrepreneurs’ personal social capital from prior training and work relationships. The foremost network nodes are the industry’s international tradeshows wherein firms pitch their produce and business is cemented or nurtured. Agents inside the industry play an important but fleeting role. Despite the burgeoning growth of social media such as Twitter and Facebook, physical venues continue to serve as the most important sites for interaction between buyers and sellers in this international network.

The nature of born global firms which from inception, seek to derive significant competitive advantage from the use of resources and the sales of outputs in multiple countries remains poorly understood. Given the lack of resources which born globals tend to have compared with larger international competitors the importance of social capital and network ties in addressing their liabilities of newness and smallness have received some attention. However, how these network ties actually operate and the nuances inside of these networks are as yet not fully understood. This paper seeks to address this knowledge gap by attempting to unpack the black box of the social networks and connectors which born globals draw upon in their internationalisation efforts. Based on a study of the indigenous Irish digital, film and TV production industry, our research points to a suite of both weak and strong connectors which facilitate the internationalisation of the firms in our sample.

This paper is an early stage study of international entrepreneurship which seeks to develop a framework fur investigating "born global" firms. Such a research topic, not alone would contribute to the extant literature but would also have implications for public policy makers and academics, as the current international entrepreneurship and "born global" literature is beginning to move from its infancy into what appears to be a high level of growth (Ovaitt & McDougall, 2005). Authors also believe many interesting research questions are yet to be asked (Brush, 1993, 1995; Giamartio, McDougall and Bird, 1993; Wright and Ricks, 1994; Hitt and Bartkus 1997; McDougall and Ovaitt, 1997, 2000). These propositions provide a foundation which warrants a much fuller investigation, as well as providing an avenue for possible framework development. Overall, the paper aims to deliver a substantial research framework for exploring small and medium sized rapid internationalising firms i.e. born globals, which are to be further investigated, by means of qualitative research techniques.