VENTURING THROUGH ACQUISITIONS OR ALLIANCES? EXAMINING U.S. MEDIA COMPANIES' DIGITAL STRATEGY.

This paper examined how media firms chose among acquisitions, equity alliances, and non-equity alliances when they decided to venture their digital business. The dataset covered 292 deals made by 20 U.S. media companies of the Fortune 1000 in the 2000s. The results showed that the choice was a function of strategic objectives (e.g., product extension and market extension), market factors (e.g., market uncertainty and competition), and media firms' attributes (e.g., technological intensity, relative size, and diversification level). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]