The Global Firm
The new era of globalization allows any business to become international. By accessing this new platform of technologies,
Castells’s vision of working as a unit in real time on a planetary scale can be a reality. Some of the advantages of this include
the following:
• The ability to locate expertise and labor around the world. Instead of drawing employees from their local area,
organizations can now hire people from the global labor pool. This also allows organizations to pay a lower labor cost
for the same work based on the prevailing wage in different countries.
• The ability to operate 24 hours a day. With employees in different time zones all around the world, an organization can
literally operate around the clock, handing off work on projects from one part of the world to another. Businesses can
also keep their digital storefront (their website) open all the time.
• A larger market for their products. Once a product is being sold online, it is available for purchase from a worldwide
consumer base. Even if a company’s products do not appeal beyond its own country’s borders, being online has also
made the product more visible to consumers within that country.