Foreign Market Entry Considerations of Emerging Economy Firms: An Example of Pakistani Contractors

Past studies on contractor internationalization have adopted a single model approach. Responding to the call of some scholars, this study has been conducted by integrating several extant theories of internationalization. Our study has investigated the internationalization of Pakistani contractors. The features examined in this paper are motives, international markets ventured and locational factors. The data has been collected using a questionnaire survey. A quantitative approach has been adopted to examine the data from 84 Pakistani contractors registered with Construction Association of Pakistan (CAP). The results of the study showed that Pakistani contractors are more influenced by the internal motives rather than external motives. The main markets ventured by Pakistani contractors were United Arab Emirate, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. The study showed that surveyed contractors evaluate a wide range of factors before making the decision to enter the foreign markets. Further, it shows that size of market and potential economic growth are the major concern among the locational considerations. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd.