The purpose of this thesis is to examine the product strategies for telecommunication exchange systems entering foreign markets. This thesis primarily focused on research questions as follows;
1) What are the differences between the strategies of Korean telecommunication firms and the foreign advanced firms entering foreign markets ?
2) Which competitive strategies will be needed to enter the foeign market as a market follower in telecommunication equipment business ?
3) Which kind of product strategies are needed to the each telecommunication equipment systems categorized by their characteristics and capacities ?
This thesis used the case study approach to examine research questions. First of all, this thesis reviewed the global telecommunication environment to verify the real situations of the telecommunication equipment providers and telecommunication service operators. Next, this thesis reviewed the related literatures such as the concepts, motives and stages of the internationalization, market strategies, competitive strategies and international product strategies. Through these literature reviews it became clear that proper market/product strategies are very efficient to the international enterprise.
Third, it analyzed three product cases of one large internationalized firm, and each case has its own internationaling activities over the world. The product characteristic categories of the case study are pubic exchange system, pribate exchange system and key-telephone system. And regional categories of each product's international activities are China, Syria, Russia, EU and USA.
After analyzing the cases, the major findings are as follows ;
1) Telecommunication exchange system frequently is transferred its technology to the less developed countries. And its technological transfer range has been expanded from manufacturing and installation to developing technologies possibly.
2) The concentrating market entry strategy is preferably used to the telecommunication systems entering foreign market. And expanding market strategy can be used when a firm has secured its own abilities in marketing and R&D.
3) The adaptational product strategy is frequently used to an international product strategy of the telecommunication systems.
4) The larger system capaciy, the more necessity of non-pricing competitiveness. The smaller system capacity, the more necessity of price competitiveness.
This is an exploratory study on the product strategies for telecommunication exchange systems entering foreign markets. The thesis contributes in the study of the international product strategies specified telecommunication systems. And it can provides some efficient suggestions to the telecom-firms of newly industrialized countries to enter the foreign markets by considering competitive environment and product/market comparisons.
But this thesis has several shortcomings and requires in-depth studies. Because this is about one large telecom-firm, the causal relationalship could not be explained explicitly. So it is necessary to compare with other companies' product strategies and market strategies.
