In this study, we apply a paradox perspective on coopetition to investigate the effects of coopetition paradox on managers' experience and perception of coopetitive tensions, and the role of coopetition capability in managing such tensions. We propose a theoretical model to posit that the intensity of coopetition paradox positively associates with managers' experience of external tension, which in turn lead them to perceive internal tension. Further, coopetition capability plays a dual role-moderates the relation between coopetition paradox and external tension, and reduces internal tension. We tested hypotheses on a representative multi-industry sample of 1532 firms in Sweden and the results confirm them. Our study contributes to understanding the critical role of coopetition capability that enables firms to maintain a moderate level of tension regardless of the intensity of coopetition paradox.

Relative to the volume of research into internationalization, inward operations have received much less attention than outward operations. This study addresses this imbalance by focusing on the degree to which firms import, how imports started relative to exports, and what import-related factors affect exporting. Findings from a survey of Finnish SMEs suggest that responding firms rate management interest, limited domestic market, and inquiries from buyers as the most significant incentives to start exporting. Import-experienced exporters assign higher ratings on nearly all export incentives, while pure-exporters consider themselves more dependent on governmental support. Importing per se has a comparatively modest, yet statistically significant, influence on exporting.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to identify similarities and differences with regard to factors affecting consumers' impulse purchases of groceries in France and Sweden.Design/methodology/approachData were collected by a random survey of 202 Swedish and 368 French households. MANCOVA is the principal analytical technique.FindingsThe analysis indicates that, while Swedish shoppers make more impulse purchases, the French consumers appear to be more attentive to special in‐store displays and two‐for‐the‐price‐of‐one offerings. Contrary to expectations, the impulse purchases of French and Swedish shoppers are not predicted by gender.Research limitations/implicationsFurther studies should incorporate situational variables such as outline of stores and supermarkets and the specific country's food culture, since these factors affect shoppers' choices and shopping habits.Practical implicationsThe findings help practitioners to understand how market‐specific factors affect shoppers' impulse purchases. These insights are important in the light of the increased internationalization of the supermarket chains' operations.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the current knowledge on consumers' impulse purchase behavior by demonstrating that, although the behavior as such is universal, there may be differences between countries with regard to the number of impulse purchases that shoppers make and how they respond to special in‐store displays and discount offerings.

Purpose – This paper draws attention to the fact that impulse buying is common behaviour among modern shoppers and that a consumer's impulse purchases of items such as clothes may be a result of the retailers' promotional activities. The purpose of this paper is therefore to investigate how promotion through channels such as direct-mail marketing, TV commercials and special in-store displays affects consumers' impulse purchases of clothes. Design/methodology/approach – Data for the testing of five hypotheses was collected by distributing a questionnaire to randomly selected households in North Western France and Northern Sweden. The data collection rendered 493 complete questionnaires, of which 332 were from France and 161 from Sweden. Seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) is the principal estimation technique. Findings – The results suggest that shoppers with a positive attitude towards direct-mail marketing and TV commercials also respond positively to in-store promotion. Hence, there are interactive effects between the three promotional channels that increase shoppers' general impulse purchase tendency. Furthermore, the findings demonstrate that the frequency of exposure to in-store promotion has a significant effect on this tendency. Originality/value – This paper contributes to extant knowledge on impulse buying behaviour by examining the product-specific impulse tendency, which is defined as the degree to which consumers make impulse purchases of a particular product category.

Adopting the Internet for advanced marketing operations opens up challenging opportunities for fi rms of all sizes. However, such adoption might destroy investments in present market channels and thus has the characteristics of radical innovation. In this article, we draw on the literature on innovation to investigate what differentiates adopters of advanced Internet-based marketing operations from non-adopters in fi rms of different sizes. The conceptual model for this study is centred on the set of internal and external factors -size, willingness to cannibalize, entrepreneurial drivers, management support, and market pressure. Our analysis is built on survey data from 379 Swedish manufacturing fi rms. The results of analysis show that composition of factors on which fi rms base their decision to adopt advanced Internet-based marketing operations varies signifi cantly with fi rm size. A number of implications for further research as well as for managers and educators are discussed.

International coopetition has rarely been studied in relation to innovation. Further exploration of effects of international coopetition, i.e. the pursuit of simultaneous cooperation and competition, on a firm's innovation performance is especially important as such a relationship is challenging with a high propensity to fail. This observation formed the point of departure for this study, which aims to increase the understanding of the effects of international coopetition on firm innovativeness and how these effects are conditioned on the magnitude of the organizational adjustments a firm introduces. We use an unbalanced panel of 9839 firms that participated in four waves of the Swedish Community Innovation Survey between 2008 and 2014 as our empirical base. We illustrate that firms that cooperate with competitors internationally are more likely to exhibit higher propensity to introduce radical innovations, yet this effect is conditioned upon the magnitude of organizational adjustments. Overall, our study contributes to the understanding of the implications of international coopetition and what a firm needs to benefit from it.

Firms' cooperation with customers and suppliers has received a great deal of attention, whereas business relationships with competitors have not been recognized in internationalization studies. This study focuses on small and midsized enterprises (SMEs) and cooperation in business network by comparing firms that are engaged in cooperative arrangements with firms that are not on how they rate export motivations, evaluate the relative importance of various cooperation objectives, and examines the potential relationship between export motives and cooperation objectives. Findings from a survey of Finnish SMEs suggest that firms regard cooperation with competitors as a noteworthy internationalization motive. The structure of various cooperation goals is examined and then related to the export motives.

Using original survey data, we investigate how British, French, and Swedish managers scanned their political environments during the crisis in the Eurozone. We expose instances when country of origin has a significant effect on scanning practices: British managers claimed to possess the most developed political scanning capabilities, making the most frequent use of government information sources. British and Swedish managers used business associations as intelligence sources more frequently than their French counterparts. We also found that exposure to the Euro crisis significantly affected scanning behaviours: irrespective of country of origin, managers strongly exposed to the crisis considered it strategically important to scan political events during the crisis, developed formal scanning routines, and reported frequent use of both governments and business associations as sources of political information. Combined, our findings contribute to county-specific research into executives' environmental scanning practices by suggesting a universal mindset of environmental scanning during times of crisis.