1、外文资料翻译 英文原文 The Role of the Internet in the Internationalisation of small and medium sized companies Abstract: Itis now recognized that many firms are “born global and initiate internationalbusiness from inception or shortly thereafter. They have been influenced by both globalization and the impact
2、of new ICT technologies.The findings are presented, including the role of the Internet in marketing, distribution, business processes and market intelligence and competitor analysis. The role of the Internet as a knowledge building tool is discussed, and areas for future research are presented. Web
3、access is available to all firms regardless of size, offering benefits which include: the reduced importance of economies of scale, lower marketing communication costs, greater price standardisaction, reduced information float time, temporal asynchronicity, increased contact between buyers and selle
4、rs, and changes in intermediary relationships. Keywords： Small firms, Internationalisation , Internet-enabled. The Internet offers a newmeans of maintaining and developing relationships with clients, channel partners, suppliers and network partners, the Internet provides firms with the means to co-o
5、rdinate and maintain communications across many sites easily and effectively.The argument that smaller firms can particularly benefit from the Internet to gather competitor or market intelligence, to promote themselves and service customers in new markets for relatively little expense is very persua
6、sive. Knowledge of foreign markets has always been integral to internationalization theories, including the work of the early seminal Uppsala theorists who argued that a firms market knowledge determines its internationalisation trajectory. firms are able to garner knowledge and information with reg
7、ard to their own specific internationalisation needs, thus reducing traditional information barriers to internationalisation. The objective of this study was to investigate and understand the behavior and strategiesadopted by rapidly internationalising Internet enabled firms. For the purposes of the
8、 enquiry, Internet-enabled firms were defined as firstly having a web address and using ICT technologies in their day-to-day activities. Secondly, rapid internationalisers were those new ventures that exhibited an innate propensity to engage in a meaningful level of international business activity a
9、t or near inception, to achieve strategic 外文资料翻译 英文原文 competitive advantage. All firms viewed the Internet and e-mail in particular as essential for business in the21st century, as it provides the service platform, which enables them to enter new markets, whilst reducing the investment and resources
10、 required in order to work internationally.E-mail served as a major communications channel with their customers, distributors, agents or suppliers and also to communicate with employees and sales offices or subsidiaries located elsewhere. In addition, many used e-mail to contact and pose problems to
11、 other specialists in the COPs that they belonged to. In other instances, such COPs had discussion areas, specifically set up to share software code, and exchangeideas.All firms offered the facility to contact them by e-mail, and increasingly initial enquirieswere by e-mail. However, levels of sophi
12、stication varied, some offered this facility simply as, info. . ., whilst others had nominated people and dedicated e-mail addresses for various points of contact within the firm. Some companies, in particular those sited in New Zealand and Australia, cited the combination of e-mail and time zone di
13、fferences as a positive advantage for them as e-mail sent from North America or Europe was answered by the start of business for the senders, giving the impression of an instant response. The internet as a marketing mediumAlmost without exception, firms were actively using the Internet as amarketing
14、 medium.Setting e-mail communications aside, the use of the Internet for marketing related purposesis the most popular use of this medium. Basically firms were using the Internet for three mainpurpose in this area: Marketing communications, Customer relationship management (CRM)and as a Marketing Ch
15、annel (sales transaction and fulfilment), although the latter was lessprevalent. The majority of firms utilised the Internet primarily as a marketing communicationsmedium or tool. These firms were interested in getting more exposure for their proprietaryproducts, services, and business opportunities
16、. There was a broad consensus that the Internetoffers a very cost-effective way for them to reach a large potential customer base comparedto traditional communications methods:“We use it (the Internet) for all the marketing type things, advertising, promotion, contact, communications,demos of work, like a virtual catalogue. Its our window on the world. You found us there! Itpowers the international element really-otherwise we would need offices in each country we work in,instead of just the US.” CEO, Media promotion firm, New Zealand.“The website gives us a great marketing tool； we
