International Joint Ventures (IJVs) are increasingly regarded as an important means of international expansion. A large body of literature has investigated the key characteristics of IJVs, however most of the research has been exploratory rather than confirmatory. This paper has developed a model to investigate (i) the effect of parent partner motive divergence and parent partner resource contributions to IJVs on parent partner management control systems (MCS) choices, (ii) the impact of parent partner resource contributions to IJVs on parent partner motive divergence and (iii) the impact of parent partner motive divergence and parent partner management control system choices on IJV performance. The data for this paper was gathered from a cross sectional survey questionnaire which collected data from Australian based parent partners of IJVs operating abroad. The results provide confirmatory evidence that motive divergence has a significant impact on performance and some impact on parent partner management control system choices. Resource contributions made by parent partners to IJVs was also found to have a significant impact on parent partner MCS choices and motive divergence. These findings provide confirmatory evidence of exploratory results and sound suggestions to the world of practice
