Entangled modes: Boundaries to effective international knowledge sourcing through technology alliances and technology-based acquisitions

In today's globalized era, corporate technology strategy is increasingly oriented towards accessing international sources of knowledge that can improve the novelty and variety of firms' knowledge bases. Technology alliances and technology-based acquisitions have become two ubiquitous modes used in pursuing such an internationallyoriented technology strategy. We propose two boundaries to the effectiveness of pursuing geographically dispersed portfolios of alliances and acquisitions, arising from managerial complexities and knowledge redundancies that the combined portfolio of these modes may engender. We find support for our predictions in an analysis at the technology level of 165 leading firms across multiple industries. The findings of this paper highlight the need for managing the interrelatedness of diverse alliance and acquisition portfolios for their effective performance.