The Development and Application of a Market Entry Process for Foreign Universities Entering the Chinese Higher Education Market

This paper presents the results of a 7-year research project which was designed to identify the most common market entry processes used by foreign universities entering the Chinese education market through alliances with Chinese counterparts. The research identifies a three-stage entry process which was used by most of the 220 universities studied over this period. Within each stage, there were a variety of options and choices available to university decision makers. The value of the three-stage process discussed in this paper is that it provides new and even existing entrants with a structured process of how to enter the university market in China, based on what other universities have done. The three-stage process discussed in this paper is wide enough to include variations between foreign universities and is therefore reasonably encompassing in its scope and potential applicability and value.