Efeito moderador da inovação na relação entre internacionalização e desempenho financeiro corporativo: evidências empíricas no Brasil e Europa

Abstract

The internationalization of companies corresponds to the geographical expansion of their economic activities, providing opportunities such as economies of scale and cost reduction, besides promoting the growth of the company through its insertion in new markets, acquisition of new resources and strategic assets in the environments that envision introducing its services, products and resources. Under the conjecture of Internalization Theory and Eclectic Paradigm Theory, companies use their advantages of internalization, property (ownership) and location to achieve such opportunities, which makes it possible to infer the possibility of a positive relationship between the internationalization of companies and their financial performance. Despite being extensive the literature dealing with the relationship between the constructs, including in less developed economies, the empirical results presented in these studies are divergent, making the discussions related to the subject inconclusive, which makes it propitious a comparative study between companies from emerging countries and companies from developed countries. Therefore, it inquires, according to the Theory of Resource-Based View (RBV), that innovation activities, or more specifically, the ambidexterity of innovation activities (exploration x exploitation) can intervene in the relationship, which has not yet been specifically investigated in these studies. In this perspective, this research aims to analyze the moderating effect of innovation in the relationship between internationalization and financial performance in Brazilian and European companies. The study sample brings together the companies listed on the stock exchanges, Brasil Bolsa Balcão (B3) and NYSE Euronext, adopting as period of analysis the years 2014 to 2018, totalizing of 340 and 1500 observations company-year for Brazilian and European companies, respectively. Different statistical procedures were used, such as descriptive statistics, ANACOR, correlation and multiple linear regression with parameters estimated by the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM). The results suggest that internationalization and innovation are more homogeneous among Brazilian companies than among European companies. It was observed that there are significant differences in financial performance (ROA) among Brazilian companies that have higher levels of internationalization than those with a lower level, whereas a high variability in the financial performance of European enterprises (ROA and MKB) was identified, but without statistical significance. Estimates of the GMM econometric models showed that the level of internationalization by itself does not provide high financial performance (ROA and MKB) for Brazilian companies, while it has a negative effect on performance (ROA) of European enterprises. After the insertion of the innovation variables, it was shown that the individual use of Exploration (R&D) and exploitation (CAPEX) innovation activities as moderators of the internationalisation level do not affect financial performance (ROA and MKB) of Brazilian and European companies, so that did not present statistical significance. Finally, there was also a positive and significant effect of the ambidexterity of innovation activities in the relationship between internationalization and financial performance, from the perspective of the ROA. Based on the results, it is confirmed the evidence of the effect of internationalization on the financial performance both in Brazilian companies and in European companies, when empowered by the simultaneous engagement of innovation activities (exploration x exploitation) which will act as a balancing in the exploitation of new current resources and capabilities and in the exploitation of new skills.