Number Of Alliances Research Articles

DEATH OF DISTANCE? — BIOTECHNOLOGY AGGLOMERATION PATTERNS, ALLIANCE PROXIMITY, AND FIRM PERFORMANCE

Leading biopharmaceutical firms need to dynamically optimize pipeline portfolios of internally and externally generated product candidates to ensure sustainable growth. This paper provides an empirical analysis of leading global biotechnology firms with respect to technology agglomeration patterns, proximity to alliance partners, and firm performance for the period 1996–2006. Findings suggest that the absolute number of technology and product alliances were approximately twice as important as proximity to partners in terms of firm performance. These results indicate that a strategy of relentless pipeline building, without regard to geographic proximity of alliance partners, may enhance relative and absolute performance of biopharmaceutical industry leaders.

Managing Strategic Alliances: What Do We Know Now, and Where Do We Go From Here?

Executive Overview Alliances present a paradox for firms. On the one hand, firms engage in a large number of alliances to secure and extend their competitive advantage and growth; on the other hand, their alliances exhibit surprisingly low success rates. In this paper, we discuss how firms can address these failures by identifying some of the primary drivers of alliance success. First, we discuss how firms can achieve success with any individual alliance by considering critical factors at each phase of the alliance life cycle. Second, we show how firms can increase their overall alliance success by developing and institutionalizing firm-level capabilities to manage alliances. Third, we highlight emerging issues in the alliance context, including the need to recognize a new class of alliances between firms and not-for-profit organizations or individuals, the benefits of taking a “portfolio approach” to alliance strategy and management, and the opportunity to transfer one's alliance capabilities to the effe...

The Influence of Partner Characteristics and Relationship Capital on the Performance of International Strategic Alliances

The number of strategic alliances has increased tremendously over the past decade. How an alliance performs is very important, because poor performance will result in the termination of cooperation. This article examines whether partner characteristics (i.e., interdependence and cultural compatibility) can indirectly influence the performance (i.e., goal accomplishment and relational harmony) of international strategic alliances through relationship capital (i.e., mutual trust, information sharing, and reciprocal commitment). The target of this research is the tourist trade industry. On the basis of capital accounts, we selected the top 1,000 tourist agencies in Taiwan to survey. We used a LISREL model to investigate the causal relationships among the variables. The empirical results showed that partner characteristics indirectly affect alliance performance through relationship capital. Analysis of direct and indirect effects showed that cultural compatibility plays a relatively more important role compared to partner characteristics. The findings also indicated that mutual trust and information sharing affect alliance performance through the variable of reciprocal commitment.

Network Effects on New Venture Internationalization: A Network-Knowledge Framework - Executive Summary

This study was designed to explore the research question: How do alliance networks of a new venture affect the venture's speed of internationalization? To address this question, this paper builds a theoretical framework, from the network perspective, to systematically examine the effects of multiple network constructs. A set of longitudinal data of new ventures in the U.S. biotechnology industry was collected and employed for data analysis. The results show that both network content (number and features of alliances and characteristics of partners) and network structure (network density) are important to new ventures' speed of internationalization.

Exploring technology agglomeration patterns for multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms

This paper provides an empirical analysis of leading global multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms with respect to technology agglomeration patterns, proximity to alliance partners and firm performance for the period 1996–2006. Our findings suggest that multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology leaders are converging in terms of their technology agglomeration strategies; and increasingly competing over innovation from small biotechnology companies. Further, our analysis suggests that the absolute number of alliances is more than twice as important compared to proximity to partners in terms of firm performance defined as revenue, profitability and market valuation growth. Thus, for market leaders this study indicates a strategy of relentless pipeline building, with less regard to geographic proximity of alliance partners, appears to enhance relative and absolute performance of biopharmaceutical industry leaders.

Assessing Unholy Alliances in Chechnya: From Communism and Nationalism to Islamism and Salafism

The end of the Cold War ushered in a new period of instability in the Caucasus, as groups formerly associated with the Communist Party sought to wrest power from newly formed political movements, which themselves sought independence from the successor to the Soviet Union, the Commonwealth of Independent States. In the immediate post-Cold War period a number of alliances, formed by groups with radically different agendas, shaped the ensuing political uncertainty across the region. In Chechnya, a number of historical relationships influenced the formation of nationalist and communist coalitions, particularly in the early and latter part of the twentieth century. Moreover, in the post-Soviet period, a series of coalitions and alliances – such as the Abkhaz Battalion – melded together national and regional groups, which themselves had an impact on the first Russo-Chechen War of the 1990s. Following the end of the first war in 1996, a series of other alliances, partially influenced by religion, linked members of the Chechen diaspora community with indigenous radical figures and foreign jihadis who espoused Salafism. This, in turn, expanded what had ostensibly been a nationalist movement into a regional conflict beyond the borders of Chechnya, a development that sheds light on the second Russo-Chechen War.

Venture Capitalists and Innovation in Mature Public Firms

By using an original hand-collected data on the professional backgrounds of board members of S&P 500, S&P MidCap and SmallCap companies, this paper presents evidence on the role of venture capitalists (VCs) in mature public companies long time after their initial public offering (IPO). We find that 30.5% of S&P firms, which have gone public almost 20 years ago, have at least one VC director on their board, suggesting that VCs' governance role extends from newly public firms to mature public firms. VCs' presence as board members is not only limited to public firms which were VC-backed at the time of their IPO. 34.8% of the firms with VC directors were not VC-backed at the time of their IPO. We find that firms with VC directors on board exhibit greater research and development (R&D) and innovation activity measured by their patenting output. There is also a significant difference in the acquisition activity of firms with VC directors and firms with no VC directors. Firms with VC directors acquire smaller, more R&D intensive and VC-backed targets. They also exhibit a greater amount of corporate venture capital (CVC) investment and form a greater number of joint ventures and strategic alliances with VC-backed firms than firms with no VC directors. Overall, this paper provides the first piece of evidence that, in addition to their role as providers of finance, monitoring and advice for small private firms, VCs also play a significant role in mature public firms, especially in promoting the R&D and innovation activity in such firms.

Niche breadth rather than reproductive traits explains the response of wetland monocotyledons to land‐cover change

AbstractQuestion: We hypothesised that, even within the same plant functional group, there are specific distributions in land‐cover classes and with land‐cover change that are associated with niche breadth rather than reproductive strategy, and that the broader the niche of the species the better they cope with different land‐cover classes and changes over time.Location: The Llobregat Delta (Barcelona, Spain).Methods: We analysed the distribution pattern of eight coexisting wetland perennial monocotyledons within human disturbance classes (obtained from the classification of land‐cover categories in relation to their level of human disturbance) and changes in such classes from 1956 to 1999. We then compared species regional abundance and distribution patterns with seed dispersal type (wind dispersed versus non‐wind dispersed species), vegetative spread (tussock versus caespitose‐running species), and niche breadth (the number of phytosociological alliances in which each species is found).Results: Regional abundance of the species was positively related to niche breadth, but was independent of reproductive traits. Similarly, distribution in human disturbance classes and their changes were associated with niche breadth rather than reproductive traits. In general, the more specialist the species, (i) the more they are concentrated in natural habitats, (ii) the less land‐cover changes they are able to cope with, and (iii) the more they are restricted to stable change types, particularly to longstanding natural areas.Conclusions: Ecological plasticity rather than dispersal capacity of dominant perennial monocotyledons determines their regional abundance and their ability to cope with recent and future land‐cover changes in Mediterranean wetlands. As habitat specialists are less resistant to landscape change than generalists, floristic homogenisation may progress in these habitats with the likely scenario of increasing land‐cover turnover.

On the complement graph and defensive [formula omitted]-alliances

In this paper, we obtain several tight bounds of the defensive k -alliance number in the complement graph from other parameters of the graph. In particular, we investigate the relationship between the alliance numbers of the complement graph and the minimum and maximum degree, the domination number and the isoperimetric number of the graph. Moreover, we prove the NP-completeness of the decision problem underlying the defensive k -alliance number.

Bounds concerning the alliance number

P. Kristiansen, S. M. Hedetniemi, and S. T. Hedetniemi, in Alliances in graphs, J.\ Combin.\ Math.\ Combin.\ Comput.\ 48 (2004), 157--177, and T. W. Haynes, S. T. Hedetniemi, and M. A. Henning, in Global defensive alliances in graphs, Electron.\ J.\ Combin.\ 10 (2003), introduced the defensive alliance number $a(G)$, strong defensive alliance number $\hat a(G)$, and global defensive alliance number $\gamma _a(G)$. In this paper, we consider relationships between these parameters and the domination number $\gamma (G)$. For any positive integers $a,b,$ and $c$ satisfying $a \leq c$ and $b \leq c$, there is a graph $G$ with $a=a(G)$, $b=\gamma (G)$, and $c=\gamma _a(G)$. For any positive integers $a,b,$ and $c$, provided $a \leq b \leq c$ and $c$ is not too much larger than $a$ and $b$, there is a graph $G$ with $\gamma (G)=a$, $\gamma _a(G)=b$, and $\gamma _{\hat a}(G)=c$. Given two connected graphs $H_1$ and $H_2$, where $\mathop{\rm order}(H_1) \leq \mathop{\rm order}(H_2)$, there exists a graph $G$ with a unique minimum defensive alliance isomorphic to $H_1$ and a unique minimum strong defensive alliance isomorphic to $H_2$.

On the global offensive alliance number of a tree

For a graph \(G=(V,E)\), a set \(S \subseteq V\) is a dominating set if every vertex in \(V-S\) has at least a neighbor in \(S\). A dominating set \(S\) is a global offensive alliance if for every vertex \(v\) in \(V-S\), at least half of the vertices in its closed neighborhood are in \(S\). The domination number \(\gamma(G)\) is the minimum cardinality of a dominating set of \(G\) and the global offensive alliance number \(\gamma_o(G)\) is the minimum cardinality of a global offensive alliance of \(G\). We first show that every tree of order at least three with \(l\) leaves and \(s\) support vertices satisfies \(\gamma_o(T) \geq (n-l+s+1)/3\) and we characterize extremal trees attaining this lower bound. Then we give a constructive characterization of trees with equal domination and global offensive alliance numbers.

The Effect of Strategic Alliances Between Key Competitors on Firm Performance

Cooperation between competing firms (or coopetition) has been under increasing research interest during the last decade. It is generally proposed that coopetition can be a beneficial strategy that can enable gaining a competitive advantage. Current contributions linking coopetition with actual firm performance, however, are few. In order to address this issue, we conduct an empirical study in the global information and communication technology sector to examine the effect of strategic alliances between key competitors on the performance of a single firm. Our results indicate that a high relative number of strategic alliances among a group of firm’s key competitors contributes negatively to firm performance. This implies that firms should be aware of the risks that are included in cooperating with too many of their most direct competitors.

Presidential Address: Our Voice in Action: Advancing Science, Care, and Our Profession

Presidential Address: Our Voice in Action: Advancing Science, Care, and Our Profession

Alliance Capability: Exploration of Its Path Dependent Development

The fiercely increasing dynamics in many industries, which are a result of globalization, are main reasons for the increasing number of alliances during the past decade. Firms foster the exploitation as well as the exploration processes by engaging in alliances. To do so, firms need specific capabilities, such as an alliance capability. This contribution aims at describing the development process of alliance capability. Alliance capability will be analyzed in this contribution on a theoretical and qualitative basis by performing a case study on a global acting financial institution, operating in a highly dynamic and coopetitive environment, the Deutsche Börse AG.

On the stage division mechanism in pharmaceuticals development processes

This paper contributes to the understanding of a recent trend taking place in the pharmaceutical industry, whereby large companies develop a meaningful number of alliances with smaller firms, to share stages of drug development processes. Small firms tend to operate in earlier stages and intuitively, this may suggest that this is because they are more efficient, or more willing, than larger firms to take such early risk. In exchange, larger firms would afford the higher development costs of later phases. In this article we argue that the intuition appears correct if large companies have enough resources to develop in-house all potentially interesting projects, but not necessarily so when they are resource constrained.

From capability to connectivity—Absorptive capacity and exploratory alliances in biopharmaceutical firms: A US–Europe comparison

In this paper, we explore the relationship between aspects of firms’ potential absorptive capacity (PACAP) on their involvement in exploratory alliances. Our study is based on survey data from firms in the US and European (the UK, Germany, France and Ireland) biopharmaceutical sectors. We use zero inflated negative binomial (ZINB) models to capture the number of exploratory alliances in which firms are engaged, and find that the assimilation dimension of PACAP is significantly more important than the acquisition dimension. More specifically, we find that skill levels and continuous R&D play an important role in determining biopharmaceutical firms’ exploratory alliance activity, while R&D intensity proves relatively unimportant. Our results also highlight differences between the determinants of alliance behaviour in the US and Europe: in the US firms’ skill levels prove more significant, while in Europe continuity of R&D proves more significant. Commonalities are also observed, however, with firms’ strategic focus and an inverted ‘U’ shaped relationship between firm size and alliance engagement evident in both areas.

Offensive [formula omitted]-alliances in graphs

Let G = ( V , E ) be a simple graph. For a nonempty set X ⊂ V , and a vertex v ∈ V , δ X ( v ) denotes the number of neighbors v has in X . A nonempty set S ⊂ V is an offensive r - alliance in G if δ S ( v ) ≥ δ S ̄ ( v ) + r , ∀ v ∈ ∂ ( S ) , where ∂ ( S ) denotes the boundary of S . An offensive r -alliance S is called global if it forms a dominating set. The global offensive r - alliance number of G , denoted by γ r o ( G ) , is the minimum cardinality of a global offensive r -alliance in G . We show that the problem of finding optimal (global) offensive r -alliances is NP-complete and we obtain several tight bounds on γ r o ( G ) .

Citing Importance of Advocacy, Robinowitz Urges, 'Just Do It'

Citing Importance of Advocacy, Robinowitz Urges, 'Just Do It'

Competition and Cooperation in Decentralized Push and Pull Assembly Systems

In this paper, we study a decentralized assembly system consisting of a single assembler who buys complementary components from independent suppliers under two contracting schemes: push and pull. In both schemes, the component suppliers are allowed to freely form coalitions (or alliances) among themselves to better coordinate their pricing or production decisions. We show that the sole driver of the inefficiency in a push system, which is due to horizontal decentralization of suppliers, is the number of alliances that were formed. Specifically, it is shown that in a push system, the assembler's profit, the total profit of all suppliers and the consumers' surplus are all decreasing in the number of coalitions, and are thus maximized when the grand coalition is formed. We further carry out a stability analysis of coalition structures to verify to what extent suppliers can reduce or eliminate the inefficiency due to their decentralization by forming alliances. We show that in a push system with more than two suppliers and a power demand distribution, myopic suppliers would act independently, resulting with a least efficient channel, which makes all channel members, as well as the end consumers, worse off. On the other hand, we prove that farsighted suppliers would form the grand coalition and thus be able to completely eliminate the inefficiency stemming from their decentralization. Finally, it is shown that, in contrast to a push system, in a pull system the suppliers can easily coordinate their production quantities to eliminate the inefficiency due to their decentralization.

Defensive [formula omitted]-alliances in graphs

Let G = ( V , E ) be a simple graph of order n and degree sequence δ 1 ≥ δ 2 ≥ ⋯ ≥ δ n . For a nonempty set X ⊆ V , and a vertex v ∈ V , δ X ( v ) denotes the number of neighbors that v has in X . A nonempty set S ⊆ V is a defensive k - alliance in G = ( V , E ) if δ S ( v ) ≥ δ S ̄ ( v ) + k , ∀ v ∈ S . The defensive k -alliance number of G , denoted by a k ( G ) , is defined as the minimum cardinality of a defensive k -alliance in G . We study the mathematical properties of a k ( G ) . We show that ⌈ δ n + k + 2 2 ⌉ ≤ a k ( G ) ≤ n − ⌊ δ n − k 2 ⌋ and a k ( G ) ≥ ⌈ n ( μ + k + 1 ) n + μ ⌉ , where μ is the algebraic connectivity of G and k ∈ { − δ n , … , δ 1 } . Moreover, we show that for every k , r ∈ Z such that − δ n ≤ k ≤ δ 1 and 0 ≤ r ≤ k + δ n 2 , a k − 2 r ( G ) + r ≤ a k ( G ) and, as a consequence, we show that for every k ∈ { − δ n , … , 0 } , a k ( G ) ≤ ⌈ n + k + 1 2 ⌉ . In the case of the line graph L ( G ) of a simple graph G , we obtain bounds on a k ( L ( G ) ) and, as a consequence of the study, we show that for any δ -regular graph, δ > 0 , and for every k ∈ { 2 ( 1 − δ ) , … , 0 } , a k ( L ( G ) ) = δ + ⌈ k 2 ⌉ . Moreover, for any ( δ 1 , δ 2 )-semiregular bipartite graph G , δ 1 > δ 2 , and for every k ∈ { 2 − δ 1 − δ 2 , … , δ 1 − δ 2 } , a k ( L ( G ) ) = ⌈ δ 1 + δ 2 + k 2 ⌉ .