LES 9: Guest lecture: Flanders investment and
trade
Mission of FIT = welvaart van vlaanderen
Introduction
Why do companies export?
Increase sales and profit
Follow international customers
Anticipation of local market saturation
Optimization production capacity
Spread commercial risk
Export strategy
1: Ansoff matrix
2: 9 window matrix of Solberg
Industry globality
Global industry: dominated by a few players (e.g. oil industry, planes, energy, pharma,
If you are small in a global industry, you should prepare for a buyout if you want to grow
internationally
Why setting up an export plan?
A written summary of strengths and weaknesses of the company is a big help in the exact
formulation, evaluation and adjustment of the export strategy
Structured plans are very important in obtaining financial support from external
organizations and partners (governments, banks, insurance, commercial partner,…)
Contributes to a result commitment of the management, there is a clear picture of the
outcome expectations of all the members and/or departments of the organization
Banks or investors might ask for it
Export planning is a process:
Internal analysis
External analysis
o Choise of exportmarket
o Market analysis
SWOT
Market approach
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, o Targetting
o Positioning
o Sales targets
o Marketingmix
Risk management
Financial planning
Action plan
If you do all these steps, you have a good action plan
1. Internal analysis
Financial
o equity vs loan capital
o FFF, Bank, private funding, government support
FFF: friends, family and fools
Management
o Is export experience present?
o Presence of external support team (lawyer, accountant, business coach, …)
Staff
o Motivation, language skills, extra people available?
Systems and processes
o ERP, CRM, certificates, translations, …
ERP = enterprise resource planning
FDA = when you want to export food to USA, you need approval from the
FDA
Production capacity
o Current production capacity allows sampling, small batches, …?
o Adequate and reliable resources available locally for possible start-up?
Choice of export product or service
o Highest added value?
o Portfolio planning
Logistics
o Can you maintain short delivery times?
o How is transportation arranged locally?
Innovation
o Need to adapt the product towards local needs?
o Check IP
EXPORTmeter
o Free
o Fast
o Confidential
o Measures strengths and weaknesses of your business
o Documented and confidential report
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