Knowledge that Transforms

This paper aims to show that alliance networks can play an important role in facilitating large-scale strategic change projects. It focuses on the particular case of ibm, whose radical redirection from an exploitation strategy towards an exploration strategy was realized by major changes in its network strategy. We show that by involving new partners in the network and by loosening the ties with its existing partners, ibm managed to transform from a hardware manufacturing company to a global service provider and software company. The findings suggest that the traditional view of large firms as being slow to adapt may not be valid because alliance networks can be used to overcome inertia.

Market-level information diffused by print media may contribute to the legitimation of an emerging technology and thus influence the diffusion of competing technological standards. After analyzing more than 10,000 trade media abstracts from the Local Area Networks (LAN) industry published between 1981 and 2000, we found the presence of differential effects on the adoption of competing standards by two market-level information types: technology and product availability. The significance of these effects depends on the technology's order of entry and suggests that high-tech product managers should make strategic use of market-level information by appropriately focusing the content of their communications.