International business strategy - Essay Example

In October 31, 1969, the company was incorporated as Walmart stores, Inc. Over time, Walmart stores have grown globally to 8,159 retail stores in 15 different countries (Walmartstores, 2009); and the story of globalization still continues. Cost effectiveness is the core competence of Walmart. They believe to offer best quality products on lowest possible prices and enable their customers to live better by saving money (Walmartstores, 2009). If Walmart wants to enter UK, their primary objective must be to keep up their brand name high; and for this they have to keep the essence of cost effectiveness.

To foray in the UK market, Walmart can take several ways. They can go for merger with another company in UK or they can forward their leap by acquiring another retail company in UK. Setting up a new company on its own in UK seems not to be a good choice for Walmart. A new set up will not have any client base, any reputation in the UK market. Moreover Walmart will not be so familiar with the business customs. So setting up a new business and survive in a competitive environment while get accustomed to its people, culture and business customs will be quite a tough way for Walmart to get into UK market.

Building a company from scratch seems to be an unnecessary and expensive way to move on. A merger means two companies coming together and forming a new company altogether and in this case the control would be evenly distributed among the owners of both the companies. If Walmart enters in UK market by merger, it needs to share its control of ownership with the other company. Now if Walmart has to hold on its uneven control, it has to go by acquiring a company or companies in UK (DePamphilis, 2008).

The current economic state has been tough for the prospective buyers and at the same time has brought source of opportunities for them. During the time of recent downturn, the prices of many