Effectuation and international entrepreneurship: entrepreneurial decision-making in condition of high uncertainty

In the last 15 years, several Traditional SMEs internationalised their production, quite often to take advantage of low labour costs. Many of them internationalised production in countries where they did not have previous selling presence. This paper aims at drawing research attention to this internationalisation model that we call Production-Oriented Internationalisation of SME. Firstly, we show that existing theories on SMEs internationalisation do not explain Production-Oriented Internationalisation of Traditional SMEs. Subsequently, we propose a framework to direct the research on this issue. More specifically, we propose to focus the research on both the changes that are stimulated by this kind of internationalisation and on the consequent impact on SMEs competitiveness. Finally, we present three cases of such kind of internationalisation. The considered SMEs performed a number of internal changes during the Production-Oriented Internationalisation. Consequently to this process, SMEs gained sustainable competitive advantages. The empirical analysis is still on going and deserves a more thorough investigation. However, it suggests that the Production-Oriented Internationalisation is a phenomenon with both complex and potentially positive implications. The fact that several Traditional SMEs may undertake such a kind of internationalisation process makes this Production-Oriented Internationalisation of significant practical relevance.