How subsidiaries arrive at technological strategies that may become emergent at the global level? Fossil fuel cars dominate the world markets. Now, flex fuel cars are the Brazilian local dominant design. Clearly, subsidiaries made differing choices in market entry timing and engine compression ratios. Why did the main Brazilian auto industry subsidiaries get deeply involved with flexible fuel cars? How did they arrive at their current technology strategies? To explain their strategies, one must consider Brazil’s local institutional factors a large and fast growing local market, the long sugar cane history, government incentives, the subsidiaries’ relevance to their headquarters, their early involvement in the development of ethanol-fueled vehicles, and the subsidiaries’ differing R&D autonomies