Strategies Employed by Global Firms to Become Leaders in Kenya’s Domestic Market

Abstract

This study was conducted against a back-drop of International Business Management. International Business is a term used to collectively describe all commercial transactions that take place between two or more nations. The objective of the study was to find out the strategies being employed by global firms to become leaders in Kenya’s domestic market. This research used a cross-sectional survey design in collecting data from the respondents. In the study, the total population for the study was all the global firms operating in Kenya; however close scrutiny is on those which have successfully managed to become market leaders locally. In this study, emphasis was given to primary data. Content analysis was greatly used to analyse the qualitative data that was gathered for the study. According to the findings, factors that have been repeatedly observed as facilitating the ease or difficulty of entry and operation in Kenya include lack of tax holidays on entry; favourable profit repatriation policies also facilitate entry of global companies. The free enterprise market in Kenya makes doing business much easier. Kenya also has a very highly skilled job market. Also, with Kenya being a growing economy, it has been relatively easy for global companies to gain momentum in the market due to the growth path. These and other factors have influenced the migration or otherwise of global companies to Kenya. The main modes of entry that the global companies that we surveyed used to enter the market included partnerships, direct entry, mergers, franchising and exporting. These strategies succeeded and were directly attributed by the respondent companies to their success. Strategies employed to achieve market leadership included localization and standardization, mergers, partnerships, market penetration and premium pricing in some remote cases. These strategies worked well to enhance the leadership of global firms in Kenya.