Trends and patterns in strategic technology partnering since the early seventies

This paper analyses some basic trends and patterns in inter-firm strategic technology partnering during the past two and a half decades. The description of growth patterns in strategic technology partnering reveals that this phenomenon has become increasingly popular during the eighties and the early nineties. Joint ventures, once the most prominent form of inter-firm partnering, have, to a very large degree, been replaced by a wide variety of contractual agreements. International patterns of partnering are discussed for the Triad (USA, Europe, Japan) in terms of changes in the distribution of domestic and cross-border alliances.