During the 1880s, the tobacco manufacturing industries of Britain and America were revolutionized by the introduction of mechanized cigarette production. The development of this novel, image-laden product constituted a triumph for the methods of mass production and mass distribution in this most traditional of consumer goods industries. The Global Cigarette charts the way in which these innovations in manufacturing and marketing methods led to the formation in 1902 of the British American Tobacco Co. as an Anglo-American multinational joint venture designed to promote cigarettes in international markets.

Based on archive materials from a wide variety of sources, including the company's own internal records, this book provides the first authoritative account of BAT's evolution and growth up until the Second World War. In particular, The Global Cigarette shows the way in which the company developed a vast array of international operating subsidiaries, explores how it managed these enterprises in different political and cultural contexts–notably in China and India–and analyses the way in which the company, as a mature multinational enterprise, coped with the severe international economic dislocations of the 1930s.

In the era of globalization, this account of the operational and organizational arrangements of a prefigurative 'global' company will shed light on current debates on alliances, joint ventures, and international business.