Deceptive behaviour and coopetition: the role of heterogeneous absorptive capacities and product specialisation
Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing
ISSN: 0885-8624
Article publication date: 26 April 2023
Issue publication date: 21 November 2023
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to study the role of absorptive capacities in coopetitive alliances that involve leakages of sensitive private knowledge regarding firms’ production processes.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper uses a game theoretic approach to model a differentiated product market in which two firms asymmetrically informed about the economic value of a business opportunity must cooperate to exploit this opportunity. Under coopetition, firms gain access to their partners’ core knowledge as the result of inevitable leakages of information. Firms differ in their absorptive capacities, which affects their abilities to leverage this new knowledge outside the collaborative activity.
Findings
Firms with superior absorptive capacities are more likely to devise alliances whose purpose is to gain access to their partners’ core knowledge. This opportunistic behaviour does not disappear even if firms compensate their partners for the damages caused by this deceptive business practice. This paper also finds that a highly specialised product safeguards firms with limited absorptive capacities against these opportunistic behaviours.
Originality/value
This paper provides a theoretical analysis of the role that absorptive capacities and product specialisation play in influencing the emergence of opportunistic behaviours in coopetitive alliances. The theoretical analysis underscores the extent to which the risk of opportunism associated with the exploitation of a partner’s specific core knowledge outside the scope of the cooperative activity affects not only the nature and intensity of market competition but also the incentives to pursue coopetitive alliances.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Funding: Chávez-Bustamante acknowledges support from the National Agency for Research and Development (ANID), Scholarship Program Becas Doctorado Nacional 2020 - 21200361.
Citation
Chávez-Bustamante, F. and Troncoso-Valverde, C. (2023), "Deceptive behaviour and coopetition: the role of heterogeneous absorptive capacities and product specialisation", Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, Vol. 38 No. 12, pp. 2589-2603. https://doi.org/10.1108/JBIM-05-2022-0215
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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