Strategic Alliances in the Japanese Economy

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This chapter reviews the role and consequences of strategic alliances in Japanese business. We are not aware of other research published in English that takes a similarly broad look at Japanese firms’ embrace and utilization of strategic alliances. Some readers may take issue with this claim, pointing out that in fact an extensive literature addresses the cooperative customer-supplier relationships that are seen as an integral feature of Japan’s ‘lean production’ model of manufacturing success (Dyer, 1996; Helper et al., 2000; Liker and Choi, 2004). From our perspective, however, those vertical partnerships housed within the durable governance structures known as keiretsu are not strategic alliances in the usual sense of the term. Admittedly, alliances such as the keiretsu that form and persist for other reasons may at times take on strategic purpose. The bulk of our work here addresses the changing interplay between Japan’s keiretsu networks and the strategic-alliance creation process in its domestic economy. Japan, of course, has been a major player in international strategic alliances, and we review the literature on those alliance patterns and how they have changed over time. However, the broad involvement of Japanese firms in alliances with foreign partners appears to have coincided with relatively little strategic-alliance activity at home, especially if we exclude government-led research consortia and the keiretsu themselves.KeywordsBusiness GroupStrategic AllianceStrategic Management JournalJapanese FirmParent FirmThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.