Impact of Covid-19 on Multinational Enterprises: A Case Study

Short profile of the chosen MNE and its international market portfolio and product/service portfolio

The sudden emergence of Covid-19 instantly changed the landscape of business around the world. Some of the features that characterize the business environment in the pandemic era include increasing uncertainty and complexity, the increasing importance of digital connectivity, changes in the international labour markets, or emerging geopolitical tensions. We already see first consequences on the firm-level, such as reconfiguration of MNEs’ activities, political discussions about regionalization and de-globalization, reshoring, and back-shoring strategies, to name just a few. With travelling often impossible and almost always limited, urgent calls for citizens to return to their home-countries, expatriates and management-teams of MNEs also had to adjust their way of doing business and living. Please choose one MNE company and discuss the trends seen in its sector after the pandemic; the challenges, and the new normal in the international economic, technological, and social environment it operates in, as well as implications for its internationalization strategy and international marketing strategy.

Footnote: A multinational enterprise, abbreviated as MNE, is an enterprise producing goods or delivering services in more than one country. A multinational enterprise has its management headquarters in one (or rarely more than one) country, the home country, while also operating in other countries, the host countries.

You must cover the following points:
A short profile of the company including its international market portfolio and international product and service portfolio.
Discuss how the MNE’s international performance changed since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic and detailing its impact on the industry and related enterprises. You must support your arguments with evidence that will come, as appropriate, from actual cases, from statistics and from the literature. Among the literature, please pay particular attention to the academic journals. These contain the most recent research findings. 
Analyse the external and internal factors that drive the transformation of you target MNE’s internationalization strategy and international marketing strategy.

Please note that late submissions will not be accepted unless full details of extenuating circumstances are provided. For extenuating circumstances please see the link on the University website. If you have any query about extenuation please contact the Student Services Advisor External Sources of Information for Case Analysis.
You are encouraged to access secondary sources of information to develop your analysis. You can include secondary data sources such as articles in case studies, business magazines, newspapers, company reports, academic journals, marketing research findings and company websites. All sources of information should be clearly referenced in the assignment.
The assignment report will present in detail the analysis and discussion of the key points you are asked to cover.