International Penetration
The case of Raisio’s effort to penetrate the global market reveals that the international market, while rewarding in a lot of ways, is also very complicated. Much of the complications come from different government regulations in each country it tried to penetrate. While the product itself has been wanted by the international market, as long as the processes required by the government haven’t been fulfilled, the product would not be allowed to enter the market. In this case, time is very crucial. The company, Raisio Oy, is a Finnish grain and chemicals company. The company has been in Nutriceutical business, where it tries to create a human nutrient-based product. Researches after researches, along with tremendous amount of expense invested in its Research and Development, have been done since the early stage of the company. It has been the backbone of the company, something that they’re particularly proud of. The company has been on the Helsinki Stock Exchange since 1989. The company has been growing steadily, except the year 1994-95 where it had a drastic drop in growth. However, the real story here began when it launched Benecol. Benecol is the low-cholesterol margarine that is invented by Raisio Oy. The breakthrough in this product is its ability to compress the cholesterol in margarine without giving any side effect to the consumer of the product. It is such an innovative breakthrough in its field/industry. As the result of this, the company’s share price rocketed from FIM 6.2 in December 1995 to FIM 64.7 in December 1997.