Innovation through Strategic Community Management: The Case of NTT DoCoMo and the Mobile Internet Revolution

Abstract

This paper describes strategic community management that can be implemented by large established companies through the creation of a variety of strategic business communities. The paper focuses in particular on the case of NTT DoCoMo, Inc., Japan’s largest mobile telecommunications carrier, which has utilized strategic community management principles in their efforts to cultivate and expand the mobile Internet market in Japan over roughly the past two years.This paper also deals with the development of an emerging mobile Internet market spawned by the creation of strategic communities supported by strategic communities which consist of informal in‐house organizations and diverse strategic heterogeneous alliances with outside firms including customers, and elucidates strategic community management as an effective methodology aimed at strategic innovation conducted by major enterprises.