International market position legitimacy:case study of the Finnish Consulting Group in Asia

The purpose of this master’s thesis is to enter into the context of service sector internationalization in Finland by examining one Finnish multinational enterprise offering professional services for consulting and planning. The company under my examination is FCG Finnish Consulting Group Ltd. (FCG) and international operations of the company are mainly focused on international development consultancy sector. In the beginning of 2016 FCG established the new subsidiary in Singapore to offer the best Nordic and international expertise to a growing number of clients in Asian development consultancy markets. The Singapore office has been running in full effect since summer 2016 and it’s derived by Finnish and Chinese employees and managers. The Singapore office is meant to work as an Asian hub that allows FCG to work closely with already existing and future customers in Asia. The goal of this master’s thesis is to research the market position legitimacy of FCG in Asia. The study will focus on the processes that in the early phase of internationalization affect the FCG’s position in the Asian markets and how these processes eventually legitimize FCG to be reliable operator in the market and end up overcoming the entry barriers. The research represents the qualitative research tradition in international business studies. In this master’s thesis the empirical primary data was collected through two semi-structured interviews. The secondary data consists of written documents and reports forming the framework for FCG’s international business and international development consultancy industry. With the systematic qualitative analysis this research offer holistic picture about researched phenomenon. The competitive bidding process and especially high requirements for previous references from previous development projects were identified to be crucial element in achieving market position legitimacy. Primary networks between consultancy firm and international development financiers and international professionals working for the development projects appear to be central networks affecting market position legitimacy formation. Also secondary networks between competitors and local governmental actors in project target countries are identified to have role in legitimacy formation. Mutual trust between consultancy actor and international development financiers creates organizational legitimacy for consultancy firms in new markets and local presence and high quality works carried out in previous projects affect the legitimacy formation. The results of this research can be used in managing and coordinating internationalization processes in international development consultancy sector. The findings are useful for also other type businesses in which public and highly structured and regulated bidding processes determine the transactions