Research On Knowledge Transfer In Strategic Alliances

With the development of knowledge management, knowledge was regarded as one of the most important resources and the principle source of the core competitive of the corporations. More and more corparations choose the way of the strategic alliance to obtain new knowledge and intergrate the given knowledge which help to foster and strengthen competitive advantage themselves. However, in reality, knowledge transfer does not reach an expected goal. Thus knowledge transfer in strategic alliances has become a hot issue in the community of both enterprise and scholars, study on the knowledge transfer of the strategic alliance will be useful to the theories and the realities.The paper establishes a process model of knowledge transfer in strategic alliances, and further divides the process into two levels:one is happened in the field of cooperation of partners where the participants are all members of the alliance,transfering knowledge among members. It includes three phases——start, implementation and upgration; the other is happened inside the members of the Alliance themselves where the participants include all levels of the organization, transfering the knowledge from the cooperation field to the enterprise, andintegrating the knowledge into the enterprise. It includes two phases——integrationand proliferation.Many factors influence the effect of knowledge transfer in strategic alliances,including five aspects:factors on knowledge, factors on knowledge sourse,factors on knowledge receptor,factors on alliance and factors on the channels of knowledge transfer. And every aspect includes different factors which promote or hinder the knowledge transfer in strategic alliance and further affect the result of the enterprises developing their core competitiveness.We can take measures from two levels——enterprise level and alliance level topromote the knowledge transfer in strategic alliances. At the enterprise level,we should choose a suitable partner,choose a suitable alliance form,establish a clear learning goals,establish an effective learning mechanism and choose a suitale channel of knowledge transfer to promote the knowledge transfer in strategic alliance; at the alliance level,we should establish the common strategic objective,communicates in cultures,establish a trust mechanism and establish a conflict resolution mechanism to promot the knowledge transfer in stratebic alliance.The innovations lies in: a special perspective which researches knowledge transfer in strategic alliances while previous studies concerned more with knowledge transfer in the organization; build a model of knowledge transfer in strategic alliances, analyses the process of knowledge transfer in strategic alliance comprehensively, especially stresses the intergation and diffusion processes in receptor corporation; analyzes many elements to the impact on the successful transfer of the knowledge in the strategic alliance in detail, lists an index system which affect the performance of knowledge transfer in strategic alliances,amply demonstrates the effect of each factor on knowledge transfer performance in the strategic alliance and also tries to analyze the realationships among these factors.