How companies without the benefit of authority create innovation through collaboration

To create new business firms develop and provide systems that are new to the market.\ud However, if a firm wants to achieve this goal but does not possess all required resources\ud and capabilities, it needs cooperation from other organizations. This study focuses\ud on how firms that lack authority to compel such cooperation, gain and foster\ud commitment from other organizations to cooperate. To develop a model that addresses\ud this question two cases of interorganizational innovation from the Dutch construction\ud industry were studied. In both cases an organization set up and coordinated a\ud network of organizations to jointly develop and market a new system. The cases suggest\ud that, in particular, three types of activities of such leading organizations affect\ud other organizations' commitment to cooperate. These include two types of activities\ud that correspond with two extensively researched constructs, champion behavior and\ud supportive leadership, and one type of activity whose influence is more indirect, value\ud proposition management. Overall, both cases can be regarded as examples of innovation\ud and value chain integration, two issues identified as industry deficiencies in various\ud countries

Does Partnering Pay Off? - Stock Market Reactions to Inter-Firm Collaboration Announcements in Germany

The dramatic increase in interorganizational partnering in the last two decades raises questions for scholars and managers regarding the value impact of inter-firm collaborations. Using event study methodology, this paper tests whether stock market reactions differ when a collaboration formation or termination is announced. In addition, the study provides an in-depth analysis of potential determinants of stock market reactions to collaboration formation announcements. The sample consists of 1037 announcements in German stock markets from 1997 to 2002. The results show that an unexpected termination announcement decreases firm valuation, and a formation announcement increases firm valuation. Further, certain collaborations are more favorable than others, depending on firm industry, age, size, collaboration constellations, and equity versus non-equity investment in partner firm. The results open avenues for further research on partnering strategies

Inter Organizational Relationships Performance in Third Party Logistics: conceptual framework and case study

Supplier relationship management is an important challenge for shippers in logistics outsourcing. This paper attempts to understand the factors which affect inter organizational relationships performance in third party logistics and proposes a conceptual framework specifically for inter organizational relationship performance in third party logistics. We also draw a set of propositions from published research and exploratory inter-views with practitioners to explain inter organizational relationships performance in third party logistic net-works. Five main dimensions of inter organizational relationships are identified which affect performance in third party logistics: commitment, supplier adaptation, conflict resolution, partner fit and communication. In order to assess the validity of our conceptual model we include a case study in this paper. The case study is based on Shell Chemicals Europe and their portfolio of seventeen third party logistic service suppliers

Boundaryless Management - Creating, transforming and using knowledge in inter-organizational collaboration. A literature review

Current literature on organizations often argues that firms are becoming increasingly dependent on knowledge residing outside their own boundaries requiring organizations to increase their entrepreneurial abilities and make their boundaries more flexible and permeable. This paper reviews the literature on what might be called interorganizational knowledge work. Implied in this focus is an assumption of clear organizaitonal boundaries. Rather than taking these boundaries and their importance for granted, the current review, however, aims at relativizing these boundaries. By focusing the empirical phenomenon of collaboration between individuals in different organizations, four different streams of literature with different constructions of the organizational boundary and its importance were identified: the literature on learning in alliances and joint ventures, the literature on collaboration in industrial networks, the literature on social networks and communities of practice and finally the literature on geographical clusters and innovation systems. The above four streams of the literature are reviewed with a special focus on the following three questions: 1. What is the role of (organizational) boundaries in interorganizational knowledge work? 2. What do we know about how these boundaries can be overcome? 3. What are the implications for managing interorganizational knowledge work spelled out in the literature?Interorganizational collaboration; Knowledge Management; Literature review

Does Partnering Pay Off? - Stock Market Reactions to Inter-Firm Collaboration Announcements in Germany

The dramatic increase in interorganizational partnering in the last two decades raises questions for scholars and managers regarding the value impact of inter-firm collaborations. Using event study methodology, this paper tests whether stock market reactions differ when a collaboration formation or termination is announced. In addition, the study provides an in-depth analysis of potential determinants of stock market reactions to collaboration formation announcements. The sample consists of 1037 announcements in German stock markets from 1997 to 2002. The results show that an unexpected termination announcement decreases firm valuation, and a formation announcement increases firm valuation. Further, certain collaborations are more favorable than others, depending on firm industry, age, size, collaboration constellations, and equity versus non-equity investment in partner firm. The results open avenues for further research on partnering strategies.

Peering Below the Surface: Social Mechanisms for Analyzing Interorganizational Information Systems Integration

In an interorganizational relationships (IOR) context, interorganizational information systems (IOS) need to be integrated in order to support collaboration between partners and provide a fuller exploitation of the systems they share. Although research stresses the importance of the two phases of the IOS integration, systems development and systems diffusion, there is a paucity of studies on the mechanisms underlying the integration process and their recursive relationships. Adopting a processual approach and drawing on the concept of social mechanisms, we propose a multilevel framework that conjectures about the dimensions of the IOS integration process (surface and deep structures) and the underlying social mechanisms that causally explain the how of the process and the relationships that dynamically link these dimensions

Analyzing inter-organizational systems from a power and interest perspective

Inter-organizational systems (IOS) are ICT-based systems that enable organizations to share information and to electronically conduct business across organizational boundaries. Especially since the increasing availability of the Internet, there have been less technological barriers to implement IOS. However, that does not imply that IOS-possibilities are implemented successfully in all occasions: other barriers may remain. Innovation is not only a technical process of ?solving problems?, it also involves economic and political processes in which interests are articulated, alliances are built and outcomes are struggled over. To explore this observation, this paper presents a model that helps to describe and analyze IOS from a power and interest perspective of multiple parties. To illustrate this model, eight case studies of IOS are discussed, of which two in more depth. After that, we will put the findings of the analysis in a broader perspective. The paper concludes with the assertion that the scope for the design of an effective IOS depends on a combination of technical, economic and social