Information Sources Applied in Search for a Foreign Business Partner and the Perception of Barriers in Establishing International Cooperation

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to analyze the relationship between the perception of the barriers in establishing an international cooperation and information sources applied while looking for foreign partners. The paper presents the results of the study on 278 Polish exporters and importers cooperating with partners from China and Germany. The companies were divided in two clusters differing in the perception of the barriers in establishing the cooperation with partners from China and Germany. The analysis revealed that these clusters differ only to a modest extent regarding the information sources applied to find a foreign partner. However, significant differences regarding the way of verifying the partner’s reliability were shown. This effect did not depend on the partner’s country of origin.