1. ¹Department of Supply Chain Management and Marketing Sciences, School of Business, Rutgers University, Newark and New Brunswick, USA
2. ²Department of Management and Marketing, Oakland University, Rochester, USA
3. ³Institute of International Business, Robinson College of Business, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA, USA
4. ⁴King's College London, London, UK

Correspondence: S Tamer Cavusgil, Institute of International Business, Robinson College of Business, Georgia State University, 35 Broad Street, Atlanta, GA 30303, USA. Tel: +1 404 413 7284; Fax: +1 404 413 7276; E-mail: stcavusgil@gsu.edu

Received 22 September 2006; Revised 5 November 2007; Accepted 5 December 2007; Published online 4 September 2008.

Abstract

Alliances are recognized as an indispensable tool for managers operating in a global business environment, and as a fundamental stage of the internationalization process of the firm. Drawing on a co-evolutionary framework, this article investigates the mimetic and experiential effects in international alliance formation. We focus on a critical unresolved issue in the literature: what is the role of mimetic behavior and previous alliance experience in mitigating the uncertainty associated with engaging in cross-border operations? An event history analysis of 792 international marketing alliance formations initiated by 317 firms in the US pharmaceutical industry is employed to test the hypotheses. The findings of two different hazard rate models reveal significant complex effects of density and cross-border alliance experience on the propensity to engage in new international marketing alliances.