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The title of my dissertation was “An Analysis of Competitive Positioning Strategies in the U.S. Pharmaceutical Industry: An EQS Application.” Doctoral students frequently are daunted when they first hear that their dissertation research is to be a contribution to the field. “What could I do, as a mere doctoral candidate, who would revolutionize the field?” seems to be the question. After all is said and done, a dissertation is the “capstone to a formal academic training process.” It is a demonstration that you are capable of conceptualizing, conducting, and reporting research in a (reasonably) independent way. The real contribution of most dissertations is that they lead to conferral of the degree, open up new career options, help you to mature as a scholar, and socialize you into the scholarly norms of your field. H. Jackson Brown, Jr. once quoted that “The best preparation for tomorrow is doing your best today.” If the doctoral degree provides tangible evidence of one's ability to function at a high academic level, then the number of citations associated with that research is a testimonial of the apparent scientific impact of that scientist. In this case, the citation rate associated with my dissertation article “An empirical analysis of sustained advantage in the U.S. pharmaceutical industry: impact of firm resources and capabilities” is my personal tour de force (see Table 1).

Provides an overview of the special issue of the European Journal of Marketing on “Export marketing”. Five basic questions to be answered in the export marketing area are identified. The articles in this special issue should provide a significant stimulus to further conceptual thinking addressed at these export decisions. Discusses policy implications. Developments in policy models await parallel developments in models of export decisions and processes.

This study employs learning‐based theory to shed light on performance among newly internationalizing companies. Earlier studies have suggested that learning is an important goal for firms pursuing international diversification. Unlike previous studies which have focused their attention on one aspect of learning, this study examines three kinds of learning from internationalization: technological, market, and social. The impact of top management's prior international experience and cultural diversity on the three types of learning were also examined to understand their contingency effects. Consistent with social capital theory, external networks with suppliers and customers are a major contributor to a firm's international performance. Also, the findings for the influence of market learning on firm performance support the assumptions underlying the resource‐based view of the firm. However, mixed results were obtained for the relationship between technological learning and firm performance. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the literature on emerging multinationals by studying the internationalization strategies of two established companies in the Indian pharmaceutical industry: Ranbaxy and Wockhardt.

The study utilizes a longitudinal case‐study approach to capture Ranbaxy's and Wockhardt's dynamic internationalization patterns. An extensive literature review using recently published works, government documents, and organizational reports was employed to give a clearer description of the two case companies.

The internationalization patterns of Ranbaxy and Wockhardt suggest that the mainstream internationalization models are more effective in explaining exploitative learning in terms of utilizing the firm's existing knowledge stock in the early stages of internationalization, while the emerging internationalization models (e.g. the LLL framework and accelerated internationalization) are more effective in explaining exploratory learning in terms of seeking novel knowledge flows in firms' later stages of internationalization.

The empirical base is limited and the use of case studies has its shortcomings (e.g. in terms of sample size, generalizations, etc.). As such, the exploratory findings of this study must be further verified and extended at other sites, especially to firms operating in regulated industries in other emerging countries. Second, the author analyzed the decision to enter a foreign market, without studying subsequent performance and its effects on further entries. The accelerated international growth may have negative consequences for the two cases, as time compression diseconomies may emerge when the firm has a fast foreign expansion pace. Further research using data from other industries and countries, and taking into account entry mode and performance could shed more light into this controversial issue. Third, the author only compared an early‐mover and a latecomer in the comparative case analysis. One of critical topics for further study is to compare different three types of MNEs, e.g. latecomer, newcomer and early‐mover, from the same industry to understand how their geography of learning and knowledge acquisition are influenced by their internationalization and locational choices.

Overseas acquisition, as compared to greenfield investment (e.g. wholly owned subsidiaries), offers more benefits to Indian pharmaceutical firms. Overseas acquisition provides access to established marketing networks, augments Indian firms' ownership advantages with new products and other firm‐specific intangible assets and, offers economic gains from improved operational synergies.

The paper is one of the few which has dealt with an important aspect of firm internationalization, i.e. country selection, the sequence of internationalization across foreign markets and their modes of integration.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the different kinds of health‐promotion activities undertaken by Chinese individuals in managing their disability from multiple sclerosis (MS).

The theory of control behavior was used in this study to understand the different kinds of primary and secondary health‐coping strategies used by participants and their impact on intra‐ and inter‐personal empowerments. Using semi‐structured interviews, interpretive phenomenology was used to elicit and analyze attitudes and behaviors of Chinese participants' management of MS.

Unlike previous studies which only emphasized the tangible aspects of physical health, the current paper suggests the importance of viewing health benefits in a more holistic manner. It was clear from the Chinese participants that “disability” and “healthy” were not viewed as two separate concepts. Being healthy does not mean an absence of disease but as role functioning, energy and vitality, social relationships, and emotional well‐being. The exploratory paper also found that empowerment outcomes involved an interaction of both the inter‐ and intra‐personal components and, at the same time, were driven by primary and secondary control‐related preferences.

Future research should include individuals with other disabilities and different demographic and socio‐cultural characteristics to confirm the generalizability of the findings uncovered here.

The impact of culture and contextual/situational variables on individual's choice of primary and secondary control strategies has important implications for developing health strategies across different ethnic minority groups.

The results provide support for the view that there are two dimensions to the process of patient empowerment. Rather than emphasizing primary control strategies, individuals can empower themselves by maintaining a balance between primary and secondary control strategies with respect to their health‐related goals.

The most commonly used segmentation approach to understand information acquisition behavior in the exporting context is to group individuals/firms on a variety of demographic and psychographic variables. This paper argues that while psychographic and demographic segmentation provide descriptive information about who are likely to engage in information search, they are insufficient to provide insights into why individuals search.

Drawing upon the applied psychology literature, an integrative framework using the key constructs of motivation and cognitive ability is developed that conceptualizes the influences of and outcomes from information acquisition.

By studying information acquisition within the context of the interactions between motivation and ability, normative insights can be gained on the likelihood of management's active participation in information search. The author develops a typology for the nature of information acquisition to explain the behaviors of user firms with respect to government‐sponsored export programs/services.

This paper attempts to make two contributions to the export behavior literature: by setting the stage for a more multi‐disciplinary analytical and deliberate approach to export information acquisition with respect to identifying relevant variables as antecedents to motivation and cognitive ability to search, and developing a conceptual framework for addressing their relationship to export performance; and advancing research propositions that facilitate empirical testing of these relationships in future research.

For decades, export performance has generated interest among researchers and public policy makers. However, despite extensive investigations, export marketing is still lacking in theoretically‐grounded conclusions. Attempts to overcome this limitation by presenting a new theory‐based framework of export performance by integrating the literature in exporting, entrepreneurship and organization theory. On the basis of two entrepreneurship‐based strategic postures, export performance is conceptualized as a function of fit among firms′ strategic orientation, environment and export channel structure. From a contingency perspective, argues that exporting firms need to match or align their strategic orientation with their external environment and export channel structure to achieve superior export performance. Briefly discusses future research directions and managerial implications.

Speed in new product introduction is a critical dimension of competition facing many firms in high‐tech industries. This is especially becoming more evident with shorter technological life cycles and increasing global competition. The dependent variable of interest studied is pharmaceutical firms′ ability to develop global new chemical entities (NCEs). Defines global NCEs as drugs that are approved in six major industrialized countries within four years of introduction. Using logistic regression, four variables were found to have a significant influence on firms′ ability to develop global NCEs: technological familiarity, product differentiation, competitive intensity and internal R&D skills. Discusses the managerial implications of these findings.