In this chapter, we integrated data obtained from the interviews conducted with business leaders from seventy-two companies across twelve emerging markets in five continents to better understand which capabilities leaders of emerging market multinationals identify as being strategic. In doing so, we examined which capabilities appear to be commonly assessed as being strategic across our study contexts, and which ones varied by industry, company multinationality, and country of origin. In particular, we examined emerging market companies headquartered in Eastern Europe (Russia and Poland), Asia (China, India, and Kazakhstan), Latin America (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru) and Africa (South Africa). Looking across the various capabilities identified by the senior managers in our study, our results suggest that the strategic capabilities needed by emerging market firms to be successful outside their home markets occur at multiple levels, including management level, firm level, industry level, and national level. These capabilities influence both a firm’s ability to internationalize and its ability to be successful, abilities that often have reinforcing influences on each other.

This chapter introduces the background and key research question of the project for this book, which is an output of a multi-country study on a highly important subject in emerging markets: what types of capabilities do emerging market firms need, and how do they acquire and upgrade these capabilities in order to achieve competitiveness in the global market? The chapter highlights two unique aspects of emerging markets: weak institutions and lack of endowment. The main theme of the book thus becomes how emerging market companies develop competitive capabilities to international levels facing these two critical constraints. The chapter also discusses the organization of the book, which comprises twelve different country studies, and presents the methodology used to select and evaluate the firms studied.

Peru became one of the fastest growing economies in Latin America following its adoption of promarket reforms. However, trade openness and market liberalization created new pressures. Entrance of foreign competitors to Peruvian markets triggered upgrades to core competences by local companies. This chapter presents the way successful firms from different sectors faced institutional turmoil by upgrading specific capabilities and developing strategic responses to obtain a competitive edge. Our analysis covers companies from different sectors: Deltron (low-tech domestic firm), Cantol (low-tech exporter), Resemin (high-tech multinational), Alicorp (low-tech multinational), Alicorp (low-tech multinational), and Lolimsa (service multinational).While the upgrading of strategic capabilities in these firms focused on improving product, service, and operational capabilities and on controlling retail operations, their strategic responses focused either on exploiting new windows of opportunity or on defending against the entrance of foreign competitors.