مریم درویشی

Considering the limited resources available, firms must rank their most distinctive capabilities in order to succeed in entering international markets. This research aimed at prioritizing transnational capabilities including marketing, managerial, human resources, production, financial, logistics, research and development, quality and standards and consultation and interaction with the government affecting on the entry of the Iranian steel pipe manufacturers producing gas and oil transit steel pipes into international markets. The study population consisted of experts and procurement, business and marketing managers of the 8 biggest oil and gas steel pipe manufacturers working in Iran. Two pair-wise comparison questionnaires employed to collect the required data. Fuzzy Decision Making Trial & Error Laboratory (FDEMATEL) and Fuzzy Analytic Network Process (FANP) techniques used to analyze the data. The results revealed that the marketing (Net Weight=0.225) and human resources (Net Weight =0.035) capabilities attained the highest and lowest priorities, respectively. The paper is sharing the value creation by presenting a potential process including systematic techniques for ranking transnational capabilities to enter the international markets considering the competitive environment.

Competitive advantages play a unique role in organizations' successes or failures because of customers' very speedy accessibility to suppliers and manufacturers. Indeed, this is competitive advantages which can make firms and organizations survive and grow in today's increasing competitive field attaining by creating and or improving their capabilities. The main goal of the study is to design a grounded theory model extracted from the transnational capabilities, but this required to explore the transnational capabilities aiming for the international markets entry. The statistical population of this qualitative research included experts and managers working in the steel pipe manufacturing companies of Iranian gas and oil industry. The data collected via interviews. The validity assured by counseling with the elites and university professors and the reliability verified by the Delphi technique. The findings revealed 496 open, 44 axial and 9 selective codes including: 1) Marketing, 2) Managerial, 3) Human Resources, 4) Financial, 5) Manufacturing, 6) Quality & Standards, 7) Research & Development 8) Logistics and 9) Interactions and counseling with the government. Finally, a new model extracted and represented from analysis of the axial coding process of the grounded theory. The model precisely clarified relationships among the components including casual conditions, context, actions/interactions (strategies), intervening conditions and consequences. Recognition of the relationships of the components will help better understanding of the capabilities. This will lead to attain the competitive advantages needed for successful entry into the international markets.