'Brand-naming' as an Entry Strategy in the White Goods Industry

This paper focuses on a particular type of export sale of manufactured goods: the supply of final products to a foreign firm which produces the same or similar goods and which markets this prearranged supply under its own brand labels. Such "brand-naming" agreements cannot be described either as a typical subcontracting agreement or as a simple cooperative arrangement between independent firms. The aim of this study is to show how the use of this practice, as an entry strategy into markets protected by high product differentiation barriers due to brand asymmetries, helped the Italian white goods industry to rise to world prominence.