Question 1: Explain the strategies pursued by MediTech to address institutional weaknesses and leverage business opportunities in the Asian region (two fifffti words)

Since the late 1980s, Asian governments have embraced economic liberalisation, lowered trade barriers and are expanding their spending on advanced technologies in sectors such as health care throughout the region. This region therefore presents megamarket opportunities for enterprises in the health care industry from the advanced nations that are seeking profit growth through internationalisation. Yet, many manufacturers from the developed world avoid selling advanced medical equipment directly to the region as it represents many challenges such as poor infrastructure, regional and sub-national variations in socio-economic disparities and many other weaknesses in product and labour markets. Despite these challenges one US based MNE, MediTech, has successfully responded to market opportunities in the Asian region by acting as an export intermediary for medical equipment manufacturers in the United States. Since its foundation in 1992, MediTech has grown to become the largest export intermediary that sells a wide range of products of more than 30 US based medical manufacturers to some 600 regional distributors in the Asian region. Besides sale of products, MediTech works closely with teams of doctors, biomedical engineers, microbiologists, and marketing managers across Asia to understand their needs and what the company can do for them. MediTech also provides training to medical personnel in the use of devices and offers extensive aftersale service and support; as well, it is working with Asian educational institutions to move away from overly theoretical curricula to more practice and evidence based medical training. MediTech's B2B platforms offer secure digital ecommerce activity for buyers and sellers of medical equipment - even for US based MNEs who are located far away. Investing heavily in prevention of frauds, MediTech compels merchants to register their companies using real names, hosts email communications between buyers and sellers - posting photos of products and maintains a deposit of $20000 which serves as financial insurance for buyers. As an escrow for the transaction Medipay increases market confidence. Once the buyer pays into the Medipay platform for the goods they ordered, the information is transmitted to the sellers and the goods are shipped to the buyer. Once the goods are received and approved by buyers, Medipay releases funds to sellers. If goods are unsatisfactory, they can be returned to the seller and money refunded to the buyer.