This article deals with how export oriented Austrian companies effect code choice in their business relationships with customers from Romance language speaking countries. The focus lies on the most widespread Romance languages, therefore on French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese speaking customers.
The question of code choice in export should be raised at different levels: an economic macro-, an industry-related and corporate meso- and an individual micro-level. The latter stands for the interaction between dispositional, motivational and situational factors that can be found in the context of business relationships. This article tries to describe these levels as well as to show their close interdependence within an integrated model. The model is illustrated by three case studies of export oriented Austrian companies from three different sectors of industry. In this way, we aim to show how the different factors of code choice interact and intertwine to create always new and different, but rational and meaningful business and language constellations.