Introduction to Part II

Abstract

One major issue brings the three chapters in Part II together: the search for the sources of competitive advantage. Chapters 7–9 deal with this issue. Cuervo-Cazurra and Un (Chapter 7) develop an exhaustive framework to identify the sources of competitive advantage of multinational companies (MNCs). In their framework they go down to local unit (subsidiary) level to identify sources of competitive advantage. The other two chapters, del Sol, (Chapter 8) and Rangan and Drummond (Chapter 9), are more detailed, in that their focus is the performance of specific subsidiaries from two different points of view. Del Sol looks at the performance of subsidiaries from a common home country. The perspective adopted is that of a developing country in its efforts to develop successful international firms. Rangan and Drummond look at performance of subsidiaries in a common host country, focusing on international competition rather than international expansion. However, in trying to identify the sources of advantage in the host country, they end up finding geographical and historical reasons that might as well have their origins in the international expansion processes of competing firms.KeywordsCompetitive AdvantageHost CountryBusiness GroupLocal PartnerHarvard Business SchoolThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.