International joint ventures have come to account for an increasingly large proportion of foreign market entry modes. However, rather than the joint venture format—in which both partners share ownership and control—persisting indefinitely, the phenomenon of one partner acquiring the other partner's equity stake to gain management control or further converting the venture into a wholly owned subsidiary has been conspicuously on the rise. This paper introduced the real options perspective, which views joint ventures as mechanisms for hedging against and exploiting uncertainty, to explain the causes, timing, and processes of such equity acquisitions. Furthermore, the study sought to provide empirical support alongside theoretical explanations through an empirical analysis employing Event History Analysis of international joint ventures established in the domestic manufacturing sector. The empirical results demonstrated that joint ventures possess the character of real options: when risks are high due to internal and external uncertainties related to the investment, firms form joint ventures with partners capable of providing complementary resources to reduce risk, and when the uncertainty inherent in the joint venture is resolved and the venture's value is high (i.e., growth potential and profitability increase), they acquire the other partner's equity stake. Additionally, since equity transactions between partners involve negotiation, it was found that the likelihood of equity transactions being consummated is higher when profitability and growth prospects are inconsistent rather than consistent, as the divergence increases the probability that the two partners will differently evaluate the value of the joint venture's assets. Finally, an analysis of the factors affecting equity acquisition from the perspectives of the foreign partner and the domestic partner, respectively, showed that the foreign partner is more likely to acquire the other partner's equity stake when profitability is high, whereas the domestic partner is more likely to do so when growth potential is high.