Alliance structure choice in the telecommunications industry: between resource type and resource heterogeneity

This empirical research analyses how firm resources influence the choice of governance structures in strategic alliances in the German telecommunications industry. The results of the study indicate that the choice of governance structure is determined by knowledge-based resources rather than resource heterogeneity, and support the claim that partner firms will use equity to safeguard their knowledge-based resources against opportunistic behaviour and unintended transfer of such resources. This paper also shows that there is no significant impact of trust, the number of alliance partners and whether the alliance partner competes in the same business, on the choice of the governance structures. Nationality of the alliance partners, strategic importance of the alliance and asset specificity are strongly confirmed as factors significantly influencing the alliance structure choice in the German telecommunications industry.