Internationalisation in the Digital Age : A Case Study of a Born Digital and Their Road to Internationalisation

Abstract: Background:             Internationalisation for businesses has been researched for decades and has been well understood. However, new types of organisations have emerged in the digital age, disrupting the organisational landscape. One of these disruptive organisations is born digitals (BD), which have become more prominent in recent years. Some of the biggest companies today are BDs, including Google and Spotify. However, how they internationalise and their processes look is not well understood. Because of this, it is of interest to understand how these organisations internationalise as they have been such a disruptive force in the international market.  Purpose:                       The purpose of the study is to investigate the internationalisation process of a BD firm, to recognise what internal and external factors influence their decision-making and whether specific strategies are being used. It aims to utilise prior internationalisation theories to provide a further understanding of these organisations and the way they work. The goal of the study is also to provide a framework that BDs can use to internationalise successfully.  Method:                         This study implemented a qualitative research design with an inductive approach and a single case study for the research design. The case company works with search engine optimisation (SEO) within the online service providers (OSP) industry. It included interviews with six employees from the company, with a total of nine interviews. The interviews were conducted in a semi-structured manner to create flexibility in the interview design.   Conclusion:                  The key points of the study results were the following: (i) several internal and external factors and how they influenced BDs' internationalisation were identified, and which factors had a more significant impact on their processes. (ii) It was identified that they do not plan for specific internationalisation strategies, however, it was seen that they do develop strategies, although done unconsciously. (iii) This resulted in the development of a new framework that aims to provide insights into the process BDs undergo when internationalising.