A Navigational Map of Sustainable Innovations in Emerging Markets Multinationals: A Bibliometric Analysis

ABSTRACT We explore sustainable innovation in the context of emerging market multinational enterprises (EMNEs) for two reasons. First, there is an immediate need to consolidate the literature to accumulate current knowledge. Second, there is limited research mapping on sustainable innovations by EMNEs. Since emerging markets contribute two‐thirds of the global foreign direct investment flows and greenhouse gas emissions, there is an urgent need to reflect on the implications of sustainable innovations in EMNEs. Therefore, our study is unique compared to previous literature reviews. We combined Elsevier's Scopus and Clarivate Analytics's Web of Science databases and gathered 155 eligible documents from 1991 to 2025 to perform a bibliometric analysis through the R‐studio bibliometrix package (Biblioshiny). The specific niche this study fills is catering to sustainable innovations in EMNEs, tracing the trajectory of scientific research and identifying phases of evolution, trends in keywords, articles, journal performance, most productive and influential authors, and their collaboration patterns. We identify three principal phases of evolution: initial evolution (1991–2015), middle evolution (2016–2021), and recent evolution (2022–2025), which demonstrates the growing interest of academia. Three themes evolved during the initial evolution, with further themes incorporated in the middle and recent evolution periods.