Environment, strategic alliance, and performance: An empirical study of United States firms

The main purposes of this study are threefold: First, to identify the internal critical factors in the alliance development; Secondly, to examine the effect of external environment on these internal critical factors; Third, to investigate the effect of the external environment and the internal critical factors on alliance performance.; A combination of qualitative and quantitative analysis was used. Four companies with 14 alliances were studied to investigate the dynamics of strategic alliance. A conceptual model based on the perspectives of strategic behavior approach, transaction cost approach, and organizational approach was developed and tested with empirical data. Two major explaining factors, external environment and strategic alliance variables, were included in the model to examine their relationships with alliance performance. The environment includes three dimensions of munificence, dynamism, and complexity and strategic alliance variables are composed of strategic motives, alliance forms, interfirm diversity, and alliance process climate. 95 out of 566 questionnaires were returned and used for the quantitative analysis. It represented a useable response rate of 17%.; The major findings of this study indicate: (1) Environment should be treated as a multidimensional construct. (2) Environment plays a direct and significant role in affecting the degree of strategic motives and in determining the choice of alliance forms. Also, environment affects the relationships between some alliance variables and alliance performance. (3) Alliance performance is significantly affected by the following variables: (a) strategic motives of market & economics, shaping competition, technology development, and regulation; (b) alliance forms; (c) Interfirm diversity of culture & management and size; and (d) process climate of interaction and control. (4) The relative importance of strategic motives is positively related to the degree of environmental munificence, dynamism, and complexity. On the choice of alliance forms, firms are more likely to choose equity-based alliances in the less munificent, dynamic, and complex environment. On the other hand, contract-based alliances are favored in the more munificent, dynamic, and complex environment. (5) Interaction effectiveness has a negative and significant relationship with nationality, culture and management, and size. Control only has a negative and significant relationship with size. These findings provide guidelines for managers wishing to establish strategic alliances.; Three academic approaches—strategic behavior, transaction cost, and organizational learning—were used to understand the complicated nature of strategic alliances. The results of this study demonstrate the need to adopt a multifaceted view. Strategic behavior perspective provides meaningful insights on why firms have stronger intention to form strategic alliances as they are in a more munificent, dynamic and complex environment and how firms choose the alliance forms in order to react to the different environmental situations. Organizational learning and transaction cost perspectives justify the effect of alliance variables including alliance forms, interfirm diversity, and process climate, on alliance performance.