International Niche Businesses

MUCH OF THE material leading up to this Chapter has been concerned with the creation and development of international growth businesses in sectors such as healthcare and technology, and the case studies in the previous Chapter give some examples of companies that I have been involved with in this area. Usually the key to success for a young growth company is to have a narrow product focus and to exploit this as widely as practicable in the international market. As touched on earlier in the book, such companies are often called international niche businesses, the best of which concentrate on what they know and do it extremely well. In any theatre of life, a person is more likely to be successful sticking to what he or she is trained for and has become proficient in, rather than branching out into new spheres of activity which are foreign. It is possible, and sometimes necessary, for a business to broaden out and diversify, once it is established, but the process takes time, money and patience and, even then, there are risks attached. A sporting parallel would be a tennis professional taking up golf: the transition is not impossible, and indeed there are a number of examples where it has been successfully achieved, but he or she would be wise to keep the day job during the learning process!