Current research has clearly documented why and how internationalizing firms realize their discretionary adaptation in host countries. The context of a well-established product category is often studied to assess the performance of firms’ adaptation strategy. Yet there has been less research on how and when internationalizing firms, through their discretionary adaptation, shape the formation of the product category to which firms’ offerings belong. This paper examines the dynamic interplay of internationalizing firms’ adaptation strategy and the local product category through a qualitative study of the formation of the Korean pop music (K-pop) category in Vietnam. We show that discretionary adaptation is an iterative market-shaping process through which internationalizing firms engage and orchestrate different local actors in their market work to shape the symbolic meanings of the product category. The more speciated the local product category, the more firms and local actors intensify their engagement practices.
