The Impact of Industry Environment on Early Market Entry Decisions by B2b Managers in the U.S. And Japan

Industrial Marketing Management, Vol. 39, No. 5, pp. 832-843, July 2010

Posted: 28 Feb 2012

See all articles by Roger Calantone

Roger Calantone

Michigan State University

Anthony Di Benedetto

Temple University

Michael Song

Barclays Investment Bank

Date Written: 2010

Abstract

Managers form simplified mental models to cope with market environment uncertainties and to process information. A critical decision is whether to enter a high-potential market early. Large innovation and development investments involved in this decision increase uncertainty. We examine the importance ascribed by U.S. and Japanese managers to competitive forces when making early market entry decisions. We expect that the competitive forces will have different effects on the likelihood of early market entry in the U.S. versus Japan due to cultural and business environment differences, and we thereby develop several propositions. We develop a decision-making exercise simulating early market entry decisions, and tested our propositions with managers in medium to large business-to-business (B2B) firms from both countries. We assessed impacts of the competitive market forces on entry strategy selection via relative weights, repeated-measures analysis of variance, and frequency analysis. Our findings revealed differences in the mental models of Japanese and U.S. managers. Buyer power had a larger effect on the decision to make an early market entry for Japanese managers, while threat of new firm entry had a larger effect for U.S. managers; these findings were consistent with our propositions. We also found several areas of agreement between U.S. and Japanese managers. We conclude with theoretical implications and recommendations to B2B management.

Suggested Citation

Calantone, Roger and Di Benedetto, Anthony and Song, Michael, The Impact of Industry Environment on Early Market Entry Decisions by B2b Managers in the U.S. And Japan (2010). Industrial Marketing Management, Vol. 39, No. 5, pp. 832-843, July 2010, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2012745

Roger Calantone

Michigan State University ( email )

Agriculture Hall
East Lansing, MI 48824-1122
United States

Michael Song

Barclays Investment Bank ( email )

5 The North Colonnade
London, Canary Wharf E14 4BB
United Kingdom

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