Prior work has focused on the relationships between buyers and individual suppliers. However, many technological products are made up of a number of subcomponents whose completion requires coordinated efforts from different activity suppliers. Ours is one of the first papers to examine the selecting of a team of subcomponent suppliers as a function of each supplier’s individual characteristics and the experience the suppliers have in working with each other. Abstract and download

Topics: Buyer-supplier relationship, TCE, Teams, Technological capabilities, Problem solving view

Almost every business network exists in the context of a larger population of similar organizations, but research has not produced a clear understanding of how similar firms outside a focal network influence the performance of network members. In this paper, we derive a theoretical distinction between inter- and extra-network firms and demonstrate empirically that the impact of extra-network firms varies inversely with the relationship-specificity of network ties. Abstract and download

Topics: Networks, Buyer-supplier relationship, Structural autonomy

We extend the existing literature on firms’ responses to disruptive technologies by examining how the length and number of an incumbant’s ties to suppliers affect the probability of it adopting a new technology. Uniquely, we bring together the inter- and intra-organizational views of technology adoption. Abstract and download

Topics: Pre-entry experience, Technology management, Networks, Buyer-supplier relationship

We integrate insights from organizational capabilities, organizational economics, and industry evolution to examine industry entrants’ boundary choices about value chain activities, and test hypotheses in 1978–2009 data from a sample of U.S. bioethanol producers. Abstract and download

Topics: Pre-entry experience, Buyer-supplier relationship, Industry evolution, Governance, Value chain activity

This paper debunks the myth of a monolithic model of “Japanese-style” supply relationships and illustrates how idiosyncratic elements of an industry’s environment interact with a country’s institutional environment. Abstract and download

Topics: Japan, Buyer-supplier relationship, Institutions

The introduction to a special issue of Management Revue on governing inter-organizational relationships for which I was guest editor, along with Thomas Mellewigt and Antoinette Weibel. Abstract and download

Topics: Governance choice, Alliances, Buyer-supplier relationship

Filling a gap in the literature on modularity, whch has largely focused on modularities benefits for buyers, we explore how three aspects of a supplier’s relationships with its customers affect the supplier’s survival: duration of buyer–supplier relationships, autonomy from customers, and links to prominent buyers. Abstract and download

Topics: Modularity, Buyer-supplier relationship, Automotive industry