Managing Strategic Alliances in China （1）-Background and Experience

Creating effective strategic alliance is a useful method for the global expansion of international companies and managing strategic alliances is an important research project to the success of strategic alliances. This paper focuses on the practical problems of strategic alliances in China and explores how to manage such alliances. This research aims to introduce the basic background of strategic alliances, analyzes the primary reason for the current situations of strategic alliances, discusses the advantages and disadvantages of strategic alliances, gives the successful factors managing strategic alliances and discusses what should be done in the future research about strategic alliances？     

Asymmetric performance: the market share impact of scale and link alliances in the global auto industry

This study investigates how participating in strategic alliances with rivals affects the relative competitive positions of the partner firms. The paper builds on studies that show significant differences in the outcomes of scale and link alliances. The study argues that the more asymmetric outcomes of link alliances translate into greater changes in the relative market shares of the partner firms, due to unbalanced opportunities for inter‐partner learning and learning by doing. We find support for this argument by examining 135 alliances among competing firms in the global automobile industry, from 1966 to 1995. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Identity, identification, and relationship through social alliances

The authors studied social alliances, a type of corporate societal marketing initiative. Their research finds that social alliances are an important means whereby employees identify more closely with their organizations while gaining a greater sense of being whole, integrated persons. Furthermore, this integration allows both organizations and their members to align their commercial identities with their moral and social identities. As organizational members struggled to resolve conflicts within their own identities, they were aided by social alliances, which in turn led them to identify more with their organizations. Unlike previous research, the findings suggest that the kind of connections referred to by the informants went well beyond the cold, rational associations described in previous research to emotional attachments that appear to be critical to organizational identification. The results also suggest that participation in social alliances may result in multiple forms of identification: intra- and interorganiza-tion identification. Ida E. Berger (bergeri@ryerson.ca) is the associate director of faculty affairs and a professor of marketing in the School of Business Management at Ryerson University. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Toronto. Her articles have appeared in leading marketing journals, including theJournal of Consumer Research, Public Policy and Marketing, theJournal of Consumer Psychology, andCalifornia Management Review. Her current research interests include social alliances, voluntary and nonprofit sector studies, diversity, and the value of sports in social inclusion. Her teaching interests include marketing theory, consumer behavior, and marketing communications. Peggy H. Cunningham (pcunningham@business.queensu.ca) is the Marie Shantz Teaching Associate Professor of Marketing, School of Business, in the Queen’s University. She completed her Ph.D. at Texas A&M University. Dr. Cunningham’s research interests revolve around two related themes: marketing ethics and marketing partnerships (international strategic alliances, partnerships between for-profit and not-for-profit organizations, relationships between firms and their customers). These areas of study are linked by their focus on the concepts of trust, integrity, and commitment. She is the coauthor of the Canadian editions of a number of marketing textbooks (Marketing Management; Principles of Marketing; and Marketing: An Introduction). Her work is published in a number of journals, including theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, the Journal of International Marketing, and California Management Review. Minette E. Drumwright (mdrum@mail.utexas.edu) is an associate professor with a joint appointment in the College of Communication (Department of Advertising) and the College of Liberal Arts at The University of Texas at Austin. Previously, Dr. Drumwright was on the marketing faculties of Harvard Business School and the University of Texas Business School. She currently is the faculty chair of the Bridging Disciplines Program in Ethics and Leadership at the University of Texas. She has a Ph.D. in business administration (marketing) from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Drumwright’s current research is in the areas of corporate social responsibility, marketing for nonprofit organizations, and business ethics. Her focus is on understanding how managers and consumers integrate noneco-nomic criteria related to society into their decision making. Dr. Drumwright has studied noneconomic criteria in various contexts, including cause-related marketing, partnerships between companies and nonprofit organizations, socially responsible buying behavior, and corporate volunteerism. Her articles and cases have been published in various books and journals, includingCalifornia Management Review, theJournal of Advertising, and theJournal of Marketing.     

知识联盟中的学习障碍研究

知识联盟是企业获取外部知识的重要途径。然而 ,在知识联盟中却蕴含着各种形式的学习障碍 ,制约了知识的有效转移。本文首先从知识、企业和联盟对象三方面分析了联盟中学习障碍的状况及主要来源。     

The Importance of Social Capital to the Management of Multinational Enterprises: Relational Networks Among Asian and Western Firms

Social capital is an important concept for multinational firms. Firms operating in global markets rarely have adequate resources to compete effectively in global markets; they access the needed resources through formal and informal relationships with other firms. The cultures in Asian countries have emphasized relationships much more strongly than Western firms. Thus, relational capital, based on guanxi (China), kankei (Japan) and inmak (Korea), provides the framework for business dealings in many Asian countries. As a result, the social capital of many Asian firms gives them a potential competitive advantage in global markets. Western firms must develop social capital and learn to manage relational networks to gain and sustain a competitive advantage in global markets. Western firms can learn how to develop and manage social capital from Asian firms. Alternatively, social capital has some disadvantages. Firms are limited by their networks and thus experience opportunity costs and path dependence. Additionally, while Asian firms often have strong network ties in their domestic markets, they have to develop many more ties globally to operate effectively in global markets. As a result, the development and management of social capital has become of critical importance for competitive advantage in global markets.     

Agency hazards and alliance portfolios

Prior research over several decades has catalogued many positive motives underlying firms' decisions to engage in joint ventures and other forms of alliances. In this empirical analysis, we investigate whether agency problems brought about by the separation of ownership and control also stimulate the development of firms' joint venture portfolios. By focusing on joint ventures, as opposed to diversification in general or acquisitions, we address the recent debate on agency theory's domain. Results from a sample of U.S. manufacturing firms' alliance portfolios offer supporting evidence, and comparable findings are obtained for international and domestic joint ventures. Agency hazards are also found to bring about extensions of firms' nonequity alliance portfolios in both the international and domestic settings. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Free‐riding in multi‐party alliances: The role of perceived alliance effectiveness and peers' collaboration in a research consortium

Research summary : Multi‐party alliances rely on partners' willingness to commit and pool their efforts in joint endeavors. However, partners face the dilemma of how much to commit to the alliance. We shed light on this issue by analyzing the relationship between partners' free‐riding—defined as their effort‐withholding—and their perceptions of alliance effectiveness and peers' collaboration. Specifically, we posit a U‐shaped relationship between partners' subjective evaluations of alliance effectiveness and their free‐riding. We also hypothesize a negative relation between partners' perceptions of the collaboration of peer organizations and their free‐riding. Results from a mixed‐method study—combining regression analysis of primary data on a major inter‐organizational research consortium and evidence from two experimental designs—support our hypotheses, bearing implications for the multi‐party alliances literature. Managerial summary : Free‐riding is a major concern in multi‐party alliances such as large research consortia, since the performance of these governance forms hinges on the joint contribution of multiple partners that often operate according to different logics (e.g., universities, firms, and government agencies). We show that, in such alliances, partners' perceptions have relevant implications for their willingness to contribute to the consortium's shared goals. Specifically, we find that partners free‐ride more—that is, contribute less—when they perceive the effectiveness of the overall alliance to be either very low or very high. Partners also gauge their commitment to the alliance on the perception of the effort of their peers—that is, other organizations similar to them. These findings provide managers of multi‐party alliances with additional levers to motivate partners to contribute fairly to such joint endeavor. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Toward an Understanding of Strategic Inter-Organizational Relationships in Franchise Channels

Abstract

Information technology, globalization and the emergence of boundary-less communication networks are creating strategic networks of inter-organizational relationships. As inter-organizational relationships continue to evolve, there is a growing mandate for high levels of interdependency. Franchises are contractual vertical marketing systems and, by definition, represent highly interdependent linkages between franchisors, third-party providers, franchisees and customers. Organizational learning is posited as a strategic linkage in franchise systems.     

基于生命周期理论的战略联盟风险识别与管理重点研究

文章在对战略联盟生命周期和联盟风险管理文献进行总结分析的基础上,归纳出战略联盟形成发展过程中每个阶段的核心事件和管理重点,明确了联盟生命周期每一个阶段的风险侧重,并针对战略联盟的各个建立阶段提出风险防范重点。     

联盟合作关系中的信任及其规制效果的理论分析

战略联盟合作伙伴之间都坚持诚信并不是一个均衡解,任何一方的不守信都将触发战略联盟的非合作行为,并导致战略联盟失败,因而强调基于信任的联盟合作关系的动机性治理并不是可靠的机制,它不能准确显示联盟成员的真实守信水平,也忽视了战略联盟的资产投入和经济利益的影响。