Alliance Management: A View from the Past and a Look to the Future†

Abstract

The literature on strategic alliances has focused mainly on issues related to alliance formation and the reasons why firms form these partnerships. Yet the large number of failures would suggest that there exists a gap between an understanding of alliance formation and the practice of alliance management. The purpose of this paper is to narrow that gap. We begin with a review of the extant state-of-knowledge and then discuss areas in which further insight can be gained. More specifically, the remainder of the paper focuses on issues related to managing alliances over time and the role of the alliance manager, a linch-pin in the alliance management process.