The small & middle size enterprise internationalization challenges

cheese manufacturer Flor del río Anas Case-Study

Centenera Ulecia, Jesús

There are plenty of case-studies about strategy and functional areas of companies in their local markets, but not as many of them about the internationalization process. Whenever we found some, especially those developed by prestigious business schools, we see that most of them focus on the internationalization process and circumstances of Multinational companies, with famous brands, because they are widely known and there is plenty of public information about them. Nevertheless, globalization is a phenomenon that affects all kind of companies, including the Small and Middle size Enterprises (SME) worldwide.
How should these companies face the new problems and challenges when they usually have fewer resources, mainly human resources, but also financing and information? What lessons can they learn of similar companies which had already gone through this process? What do they need to adapt to become global, or at least regional, players?
This case-study pretends to become a tool for faculties who would like to address these issues with their students, to help them think about these problems, to analyze them in detail, and to develop strategies to try to solve them.
To achieve this goal, we have tried to cover the different areas involved, from logistics, to accounts receivable risk management, from lack of specialized Human resources, to brand promotion, including the debate of private label versus own label, and about product adaptation versus standardization. Each of the topics covered, present a quite usual situation for these types of companies, and ask for several alternatives to solve them.
The name of the company and the products’ brands have been changed, as well as some of the characters of our case-study, although it could be one of many, as most of these small family companies and some cooperatives look pretty much alike. Nevertheless, no critic is intended, and the case-study is for academic use only. Furthermore, no specific solution is given, as it may vary according to the participant’s inputs and background or the faculty approach to these topics.