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La internacionalización de las empresas familiares se ha convertido en un campo relevante de la investigación económica, susceptible de ser abordado desde diferentes enfoques teóricos. En todos ellos, la perspectiva histórica es una herramienta muy útil, ya que un enfoque de largo plazo permite un conocimiento más profundo del proceso de internacionalización y de sus implicaciones geográficas, económicas y sociales. El propósito de este trabajo es indagar en los procesos de internacionalización seguidos por las empresas familiares, poniendo el énfasis en los factores que favorecen su éxito en el mercado mundial. En particular, presentamos un análisis histórico económico de tres empresas familiares relevantes en la historia del negocio del corcho a nivel mundial; primero, la empresa familiar Reynolds, que constituye un paradigma de éxito comercial en el negocio corchero hasta el último cuarto del siglo XIX, y de fracaso a partir de entonces; segundo, la empresa Mundet & Sons, que, a pesar de haber llegado a ser una empresa líder en el negocio corchero mundial, constituye también un ejemplo de fracaso paradigmático por su desenlace final en la década de 1980; y tercero, la empresa Corticeira Amorim, ejemplo de éxito y de liderazgo en el mercado internacional desde mediados del siglo XX hasta hoy. The internationalization of family firms has become an important field of economic research, which could be addressed from different theoretical approaches. In all of them, historical perspective is a very useful tool, since a long-term approach allows a deeper understanding of the internationalization process and their geographic, economic and social implications. The purpose of this work is to analyze the processes of internationalization followed by family firms, with an emphasis on factors linked to them which favor their success in the global markets. In particular, we present a historical analysis of three relevant family firms in the world cork business history; first, the Reynolds family firm, which is a paradigm of commercial success in the cork business until the last quarter of the nineteenth century, and of failure thereafter; second, the Mundet & Sons company, which, despite having become a leading company in the world cork business, is also a paradigmatic example of failure because of its final outcome in the 1980s; and third, Corticeira Amorim, an example of success and leadership in the international market since the mid-twentieth century to today.

The trajectories of internationalisation followed by family firms can be viewed from several theoretical approaches: phases and models of the internationalisation process; international entrepreneurship, the sociological perspective and family business theory. A historical perspective of internationalised family firms, allowing for the integration of the abovementioned approaches, is useful to obtain a deep understanding of the internationalisation process of different sectors and of different countries. The main purpose of this paper is to identify the facilitating and restricting factors during the internationalisation path of family firms, whilst considering the influence in their competitive advantages, of ownership structure, management attitudes and other intangible assets, as well as external factors to the firms, like location. The research involved a long run analysis (of more than one century) of two firms which operate in the cork business in Spain and Portugal: Mundet & C.ª, Lda and Corticeira Amorim. One of these companies - Mundet - was closed down in the 1980s and the other – Corticeira Amorim – became, and still is, the leading firm worldwide in the cork industry. A detailed comparison of these two histories - one of failure, and the other of success - permits an accurate identification of the determinants of successful internationalisation. In fact, this comparison is useful for understanding several characteristics of both firms, some of which are similar and others which are different, allowing to test several hypotheses within the context of the theoretical approach of the internationalisation of family firms. This methodological option can be justify by several aspects. Firstly, both are family firms operating in the same business and both were concentrated on the foreign market since their conception. Secondly, both their histories encompass most of the 20th Century and both faced similar national and international constraints, which were overcome, as they both ended up becoming the leading firms in the cork business, although at different periods of time. Thirdly, their choices of location were different and, although in both cases they benefitted from agglomeration forces during certain phases of the business, location was an important determinant of the opposing destinies of these two emblematic cork family firms from Iberia.