Search Results

This chapter argues that the multi-faceted nature of alliance formation and alliance management and control creates new demands for management accounting. It considers three key components of a management accounting framework for strategic alliances: the governance structure, the performance measurement and control structure, and the process for managing the alliance network over time. It shows that new practices are emerging and old practices are adapting to meet the demands of management accounting in the extended enterprise of the strategic alliance network.

There has been an enormous increase in the formation of international strategic alliances and in the research efforts devoted to understanding alliances over the last few decades. The chapter begins with a brief overview of alliance forms and then moves on to consider alliance formation and governance structures, alliance performance, control issues, bargaining power, the role of trust, evolutionary processes, and alliance networks. Within each section, key research areas and questions are identified and the major supporting research and associated findings are discussed.

The state of the art in research in international marketing is examined for the 1990–9 period, with particular emphasis on the conceptual framework and theory development in the field. This decade was chosen deliberately as it provides a fairly broad time frame to probe any significant changes in the field, both in terms of (1) the substance of research and (2) the methodologies used, and to see to what extent these two fundamental concerns raised in the 1980s have been addressed. Thus, the study takes stock of research in international marketing to see if the discipline has overcome the deficiencies outlined in previous review articles. The earlier review articles classified the research streams fairly broadly, encompassing issues from the macro‐environment to marketing management to consumer behaviour. To make this review of the international marketing literature comparable to those of the 1980s, the literature classification employed by Douglas and Craig in 1992 (competitive strategy; strategic alliances; sourcing; multinational company performance) is also employed here.

In spite of how strategic alliances as an interorganizational form are developed to address the various needs of globalizing technologies and markets, successful alliances reveal a mixed record as such alliances face high dissolution rates. The chapter also states that organizations may be called successful if they are able to satisfy a particular set of criteria. This chapter draws attention to how general management plays no small part in alliance endeavours. It points out the conditions that have to be satisfied in attaining alliance success through providing a comparison of the jobs performed by the alliance general manager (AGM) with its counterpart in unitary companies. General managers have to be actively engaged in handling the relations between partners as well as the external relations and the alliance's internal organization. The chapter also reviews the qualities that AGMs have to possess.

This chapter shows how the firm can use marketing-finance fusion to choose bundling strategies to increase its performance. Topics covered include: how to price interdependent products, how and when to use cross-couponing strategies, how to allow for production capacity constraints, and how to reward managers of multidivisional firms when cross-couponing strategies are used. It analyzes why many bundling strategies fail in the marketplace; in addition, it proposes new metrics for measuring consumers' willingness to pay for products and bundles.

This chapter provides a systematic overview of the findings in prior academic studies related to the relationship between R&D collaboration and innovative performance. The analysis of 66 paper contributions in the last decade indicates that R&D cooperation is, more often than not, beneficial for innovative performance. The findings however differ depending on the level of analysis that has been adopted: the dyadic, the alliance portfolio, or the alliance network level. The results also vary depending on the variable chosen to proxy (innovative) performance, suggesting that R&D cooperation strategies affect patent output, process innovation, new products development, and the economic returns differently. By offering a critical and systematic overview of the findings obtained by previous studies, the present chapter contributes to both managerial practice and academic research.

Given the book's pivotal argument that there is no “one size fits all” model of either MNCs or FDI, this chapter presents a lengthy analysis and description of the many distinct forms that they take. The oft-repeated imperatives of disaggregation and avoidance of generalizations are direct outgrowths of the absence of uniformity. The implications of the widespread failure of policymakers, the general public, and most scholars to recognize and appreciate heterogeneity are discussed, with specific reference to the resulting failure to differentiate between costs and benefits, high quality and low quality FDI and MNCs depending on which of the various forms and behavior patterns are assumed by an individual foreign subsidiary. The second and third sections of the chapter consist of lengthy, value-free empirical profiles of the various forms of FDI and MNCs, respectively.

The conclusion gives an overview of how the changes in citizenship, participation and policymaking that have been part of transitions to democracy are gendered and lays out the circumstances under which gender outcomes can be positive. After summarizing the outcomes in the electoral, bureaucratic, and constitutional/legal arenas, the conclusion outlines the key factors involved in any explanation. Although women's movements are often central in articulating gender issues, more is needed to ensure that those issues are placed on the agenda of the transition and subsequently remain on the policy agenda in the post transition period. Any analysis therefore has to include the political opportunity structure and the roles of key actors and strategic alliances. The conclusion then outlines how the book's arguments fit into wider debates within the study of gender and politics and comparative politics.

As the terms ‘strategic alliance’ and ‘strategic network’ are usually interchangeably used, there indeed are some situations in which these do overlap. However, a distinction has to be made since an alliance implies the establishment of a joint enterprise within a relatively limited domain while the notion of a network entails several close yet nonexclusive relationships. This chapter explores the reasons of firms for developing networks through identifying the roles of both trust and power as necessary conditions for the effective operations and development of a network. There are three different types of network — internal network, stable network, and dynamic network. With these, the chapter also identifies the three broker roles — the lead operator, the caretaker, and the architect — and provides a description of the equal partner network and the dominated network.

This chapter presents an overview of market capitalism and the business sector in Japan. It explores the network of alliances among the major corporations that make up the Japanese economy, and provides a schematic representation of strategic alliances and intermarket keiretsu. The chapter also suggests that the proliferation of complex new forms of strategic alliances elsewhere has raised the issue of how different Japanese patterns of intercorporate relations really are. The analysis indicates that intercorporate alliance structures are a core feature of Japanese market capitalism and that they also represent a form of rational economic organization.

This chapter begins by summarizing the book's main empirical findings, which show that women's presence makes a critical difference to all aspects of forest governance: effective participation, rule making, violations, forest condition and the distribution of forest produce. It then examines how women's numbers and voice, and especially poor women's numbers and voice, can be increased in CFIs. A way forward can lie in women forging a web of strategic alliances with other civil society organizations, especially local collectivities of women. Women's self-help groups (SHGs) in India, of which there are over 2.2 million, are one example of such organisations. Many SHGs have also formed federations. The chapter considers the potential benefits of such alliances between CFIs and SHGs, and their federations as well as the lessons offered by the nation-wide Federation of Community Forest Users in Nepal (FECOFUN). It also highlights the need to energize forums of public deliberation in which women can participate, in order to broaden understanding and bridge differences across gender and class.

This chapter studies the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO). After almost a decade since the end of World War II, the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand once again enjoyed a formal strategic alliance in the Asia-Pacific. The eventual creation of the SEATO in early 1955 complemented the short-term ambitions of all four Western powers in the region. Nevertheless, diplomatic bargaining preceding signature and ratification led to compromises that diluted the usefulness of the security alliance. The United States continued to limit commitments to joint planning after the implementation of the treaty. SEATO was therefore smaller, weaker, and less integrated than originally envisaged. The organization also lacked the necessary military and economic infrastructure to be effective, which helped encourage Australia and New Zealand to focus on regional rather than British Commonwealth interests, shifting focus away from the Middle East and Mediterranean and toward the “near north.”

This Epilogue summarizes all the challenges faced by managerial supervisors, and assesses the forces that can contribute to both professional and personal satisfaction in a career well spent in the delivery of effective services to people in need. Topics discussed include meeting professional challenges for managerial supervisors, responding to legal mandates, building strategic alliances, humanizing technology, facilitating communication, and supporting diversity.

This chapter looks at how, throughout 1954, the United States began to consider seriously the creation of a wider strategic alliance in the Asia-Pacific that would include the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. Such a policy reversal reflected growing concerns about Communist expansion in Southeast Asia. The United States consequently looked abroad for support for collective action. Only a small number of states, however, could provide substantial military resources. Washington focused its attention on London, Canberra, and Wellington. Fundamental disagreements among all four states concerning Cold War strategy persisted throughout negotiations. Although welcoming the opportunity for closer cooperation in the realm of security planning, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand all resisted U.S. ideas about immediate and major military commitments in the region. Even the existence of the ANZUS Treaty proved insufficient motivation for Canberra and Wellington to agree to support Washington's request for military support. The treaty instead appeared to have the opposite effect as antipodean officials feared the dilution or dissolution of existing trilateral strategic arrangements in favor of a wider alliance. All three British Commonwealth powers instead drove debate away from immediate military action toward longer-term alliance building.

Chapter 1 defines cooperative strategy, and compares it with competitive and corporate strategy. Cooperative strategy can help to improve competitive strategy by enhancing the qualities that afford competitive advantage. It can also strengthen corporate strategy by making the corporate mission more attainable. The chapter notes the growing use of cooperative strategies in various forms. The range is wide and includes collaborations between two or relatively few organizations such as joint ventures and research and development partnerships; multi-partner alliances such as oil-exploration consortia, industry-wide associations, innovation networks, global supply chains, collaborations through information and communications technology platforms; and public–private partnerships. The chapter recognizes the importance of information technology in assisting the management and coordination of alliances and networks, but notes that it cannot substitute for trust-based personal relationships between key actors crucial for successful cooperation. The chapter then describes how the book is organized into parts and chapters.

The chapter notes that the incomplete contracting framework is especially relevant for analyzing strategic alliances. It reviews the empirical work and case studies, and finds that although many findings are consistent with existing theoretical analysis, it brings forth new issues that are not yet fully understood, in particular on how financial positions influence the terms of trade among partners and alsoon whether contracting serves a signal to the market.

This chapter focuses on the counterintuitive strategic alliance between Belarus and Venezuela. The inexorable erosion of human rights in Belarus has resulted in the country becoming a virtual pariah state. The Belarusian political and military leadership was quick to realize that much of this weaponry and military hardware could be sold in the global arms trade. Whereas Venezuela stands to gain from technology transfers and licensed manufacturing, Belarus in turn hopes to expand international markets for their manufacturing firms and, if the petroleum joint ventures succeed, recieve a significant infusion of cash as well. The chapter also discusses the scenario of regime legitimacy, economic cooperation, and military assistance, as a result of Belarus-Venezuela ties.