EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

The Role of Incubators in the Internationalization Process of Incubated SMEs: A Perspective of International Cooperation

Mário Franco, Heiko Haase and Arialba Rodini

Global Business Review, 2023, vol. 24, issue 3, 488-509

Abstract: This study aims to understand the role of incubators, involved in international cooperation networks, in the process of internationalization of incubated small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Thus, in exploratory research, the method of multiple case studies was used, that is, three incubators (cases) were studied, two in Portugal and one in England. Interviews and documentary analysis were used as data collection techniques. From content analysis, the results of this study show that the objectives of these incubators are the development of local entrepreneurship through innovative projects, differentiating between them, by the positive impact, linked to socio-environmental criteria. All the incubators studied reinforce entrepreneurial behaviour and create an environment of innovation and internationalization for their incubated SMEs. Based on the empirical evidence, the internationalization activities of SMEs are facilitated by incubators involved in international cooperation relations. Some implications for theory and practice in this area of research are also presented in this article.

Keywords: International cooperation; business incubators; internationalization; networks; SMEs (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0972150920919381 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:globus:v:24:y:2023:i:3:p:488-509

DOI: 10.1177/0972150920919381

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Global Business Review from International Management Institute
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-19
Handle: RePEc:sae:globus:v:24:y:2023:i:3:p:488-509