Knowledge Bridging: How Acquirers Leverage the Knowledge of Their Targets’ Prior Alliance Partners

Extensive research has examined how firms rely on alliances and acquisitions for sourcing technological knowledge, but we do not know whether acquirers can benefit from the technological knowledge of their targets’ pre-acquisition alliance partners. This study demonstrates that acquirers leverage relational assets inherited from their targets to access knowledge from the targets’ prior partners—knowledge that the target itself did not absorb during the alliance, including knowledge developed by the partner post-alliance. We term this form of knowledge absorption “knowledge bridging.” We reveal that knowledge bridging enables acquirers to more effectively absorb knowledge from their targets’ prior partners, compared to similar firms without prior alliances with the target. Knowledge bridging intensifies with the target’s previous knowledge absorption from its partners. Yet, this effect is weakened by the relatedness between the knowledge bases and business domains of the acquirer and the target’s partners and strengthened by the target’s post-acquisition autonomy.