Innovating through strategic alliances: moving towards international partnerships and contractual agreements

Strategic alliances are becoming ever more popular, particularly to undertake technological development activities. Their rapid growth since the 1980s is regarded as further evidence of globalisation. In this paper we analyse the trends in strategic technology partnering (STP). In particular, the use of international STP has grown, although less so by US firms than European and Japanese ones. In addition, there has been a growing use of non-equity agreements, which seem to be a superior means to undertake technological development in high-technology and fast-evolving sectors. Among other things, our analysis suggests that as far as STP is concerned, firms appear to do whatever firms in the same industry do, regardless of nationality.