Which alliance partners become attractive targets for acquisitions in biotech? Prior experience vs. relational capabilities

Recent years have seen a growth in strategic alliances, mergers and acquisitions and collaborative networks involving knowledge-intensive and hi-tech industries. However, there have been relatively few studies looking at this form of collaboration as a strategy to drive firms’ innovative performances. This book specifically focuses on the role of strategic alliances, M&A and innovation networks, providing insights on if and how they contribute to boosting firms’ innovation performances. The book has a double purpose. Firstly, it investigates at an industry level the role played by the alliance, M&As and networks in high-tech environments such as biotechnology, pharmaceutical, software and nanotechnology in creating, transforming and reshaping the dynamics inside and between industries. Secondly, it explores the impact at the firm level of factors such as cognitive distance, management capabilities, and relational and social capabilities, on firms’ global innovation capacity, measured as innovation quantity, innovation quality and innovation novelty. The book will be of interest to scholars working on the economics of innovation, innovation management studies, strategic management, regional science and evolutionary economics, among other areas.Introduction Part I: Alliances and Networks 1. The emergence of the red biotech niche and its evanescent dissolution into the integrated parallel "knowledge system" of a new bio-pharmaceutical filière. An Evolutionary Perspective 2. Innovation in US metropolitan areas: the role of global connectivity 3. Competition and Cooperation in Entrepreneurial Ecosystems: A Life-Cycle Analysis of a Canadian ICT Ecosystem Part II: Alliances and Innovation 4. Partnering strategies in biotech firms: A longitudinal perspective 5. The management of the collaboration network of the Italian biotech firms. Do firms experiments a diminishing return from alliances? 6. Which alliance partners become attractive targets for acquisitions in biotech? Prior experience vs. relational capabilities 7. Do acquisitions increase acquirers’ innovative performance in the bio-pharma industry? An empirical investigation 8. Evaluating post-acquisition technological performance by measuring absorption-related invention 9. Are M&As driving exploitation or exploration? Part III Alliances in High Tech Environments 10. Pasteur scientists meet the market. An empirical illustration of the innovative performance of university-industry relationships 11. The relational models of the software industry in Italy and Spain relative to Germany 12. How alliances in biotech are shaping the national systems of innovation in three European countries Part IV: Case Studies 13. Evolving through innovation, knowledge re-utilisation and exaptation: the case of L’Oreal 14. The case of Fab: from start-up through open innovation to acquisition