Globalization and the Information Revolution

A former Intel CEO and senior advisor of Intel Corp, Andrew Grove stresses a great importance on international competition by stating ‘you have no choice but to operate in a world shaped by globalization and the information revolution. There are two options; Adapt or die’. Grove’s statement effectively conveys a great importance of competing in a global economy in order to for an organization to expand, grow, and thrive. As of late, international competition and trade surfaced as one of the most important aspects of organizations’ growth as many barriers have lessened between countries and to make global trade easier (Twarowska, 2013). Thomas Friedman examines influences that shape the global economy, business, and competition through case studies, interviews, and statistics in a book, ‘The World Is Flat’. He points out various factors that have resulted in some drastic changes in the global market. He discusses ten main important forces that helped shaping the current world market situation; collapse of Berlin Wall, Netscape(internet), work flow software, uploading (blogs, wikipedia, and others), outsourcing, offshoring, supply-chaining, insourcing, in-forming (ability to perform search on their own), and steroids (mobile phones, iPods, instant messaging, VoIP). Had this book been published this year, the list of the forces may have even been longer. Technology unquestionably provides invaluable tools in making international businesses and transactions more feasible than before.
As Thompson and colleagues review in Crafting and Executing Strategy: The Quest for Competitive Advantage, companies can gain immensely from entering foreign markets for five main reasons. Going ‘global’ can bring them new customers, increased revenues,...

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