Strategically Poised: Balancing, Learning, and Innovating in Coopetition Three Essays on the Interplay Between Competition and Cooperation

This research dissertation explores the firm strategy of coopetition, a neologism denoting simultaneous cooperation and competition. Theoretical development and empirical investigations are conducted to tease out the tradeoff and tension of the coopetition strategy. First, I theorize the socio-cognitive aspects in balancing competition and cooperation between firms. Second, I investigate firm learning experience in strategic alliances and patent searches as the antecedents to coopetition. Third, I examine the contingency effects of multiple network embeddedness on the relation between coopetition pursuits and innovation performance.

This research dissertation explores the firm strategy of coopetition, a neologism denoting simultaneous cooperation and competition. Coopetition as a phenomenon has accrued prominence in practice, with economic actors placing a higher emphasis on constructing positive sum scenarios with competing partners. However, strategic management scholarship lacks clarity in explaining how the tensions and tradeoffs associated with coopetition may influence the formulation and the implication of coopetition.

With a theoretical and empirical focus on the benefits and caveats of coopetition, this dissertation elucidates coopetition from three angles. First, I theorize the socio-cognitive aspects in balancing competition and cooperation between firms. Second, I investigate firm learning experience in strategic alliances and patent searches as the antecedents to coopetition. Third, I examine the contingency effects of multiple network embeddedness on the relation between coopetition pursuits and innovation performance. The empirical setting of my dissertation research is technology-driven industries, because firms in this setting show high heterogeneity in the key theoretical foci (i.e. coopetition, learning, interorganizational relations, and innovation). The firm sample includes U.S. public firms in multiple high-tech industries (i.e. pharmaceuticals, computers and peripheral equipment, electronics and electronic components, aerospace and aircraft, telecommunication, and medical devices). I construct a panel data with firm-year observations of financial records, alliance and M&A records, and patent records from 1987 to 2006 to test my hypotheses.