Competitiveness of Latin American born global

: the case of Digital Partners Group

Abstract

Nowadays a globalize world is demanding more competitiveness from the international
companies, as entrepreneurs are going more and more international. However, every continent
like each of their countries are not giving their companies the same advantages to compete;
through time every nation has developed their own cultural, social and economic characteristics,
which allow their companies to compete in international markets.
Following above paragraph, this thesis will aim to explore how competitive are the Latin
America born globals in comparison other international SME; Based on internal capabilities
and environment factors as social, cultural and economic characteristics. For this purpose, this
thesis directed its effort on reviewing the internationalization of a Colombian SME, company
called “Digital Partners Group”, which as a Latin American born global has confronted some
difficulties in terms of international performance. Thus, with the aim to direct this research,
were conducted some interviews with the chief executive officer, chief technology officer and
one of the experts of the Colombian team. From the findings gathered, it was conceivable to
find difference between the international performance between the Latin companies and firms
in developed regions. Furthermore, the study highlight that the main factors of the differences
between performance come from more from external factor than internal capabilities.
Nevertheless, the research concludes that even if Latin America has talented work capital, the
main reason of lack if competitiveness came from social, political and cultural factors.

Date of Award	27 Jul 2017
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Laure Leglise (Supervisor)