ABSTRACT

Anglo-Dutch consumer products giant Unilever operates numerous divisions and subsidiaries around the world and is well regarded as both a tenacious competitor and a good local citizen. When it purchased Brazilian ice cream maker Kibon, local skeptics assumed that the small company would disappear inside the huge multina-tional. 1 However, Unilever had other plans. It wanted Kibon to retain its unique Brazilian flavor while at the same time becoming an integral part of Unilever’s Latin American business strategy.