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The purpose of this paper is to examine network failures and the main reasons why network organizations, intentionally developed by a group of actors to pursue specific goals, become unfruitful and fail in their goals and expectations of creating collective value. The goal of this paper is thus to contribute a better understanding of the reasons network organizations encounter problems in their dynamics that prevent them from reaching the expected outcomes.

The study is firstly based on a literature review finalized to identify the main variables considered as potentially impacting on network failures. Secondly, the paper is based on a survey conducted on 189 strategic networks that highlighted difficulties in achieving their goals. An analysis of the 24 questionnaires returned generated the results discussed. The empirical study concerns strategic networks intentionally created and signed by Italian SMEs according to a specific law designed to promote the development of inter-firm cooperation (“network contracts”).

The results of the research highlight the role of specific key items related to individual, structural, legitimacy, interaction and governance variables in explaining failures in network organizations. According to the data, failure can occur immediately before the network start-up, resulting in a blocked network or in a subsequent developmental stage, resulting in a dormant network. The empirical research demonstrated that the items affecting network failure differ between blocked and dormant networks. The authors explain such differences, considering them according to the expected goals declared by the two different types of networks.

The question of why networks fail is relevant in times of disruption and digitalization when new forms of organization are needed to link businesses and various stakeholders and thereby develop innovative and sustainable ideas for an entrepreneurial future. However, very few studies have examined network failure. The study contributes to this field of research by investigating the dynamics of networks intentionally developed to reach shared goals. The findings can be useful to both companies that decide to start up a strategic network and the policymakers that promote, finance and monitor inter-firm collaboration.

This article reports on the current state of Common Logistics Center (CLC) adoption in Korea’s industrial complex, identifies the benefits of and barriers of adopting Common Logistics Centers, and provides recommendations for the adoption/expansion of Common Logistics Centers. The author surveyed a cross-sectional of 175 firms in the industry, followed by interviews in an industrial complex in Incheon, Korea. The author founded the benefits and barriers of Common Logistics Centers and the major factors that encourage companies’ participation.

Industry 4.0 is assumed to yield extensive industry-spanning opportunities. However, exploiting these opportunities requires a targeted implementation of Industry 4.0. The purpose of this paper is to generate a deeper understanding of relevant implementation action. Existing recommendations are mostly general, highly aggregated and difficult to grasp. Yet, specific and concrete actions that need to be taken to accelerate the realization of Industry 4.0 are essential.

The article uses 13 semi-structured in-depth expert interviews as the source of empirical data. The interviews were conducted with managers from Industry 4.0-experienced German manufacturing companies. All interviews are analyzed using qualitative content analysis.

The study reveals relevant and targeted aspects for Industry 4.0 implementation: the development of Industry 4.0-specific know-how, securing financial resources, integrating employees into the implementation process and establishing an open-minded and flexible corporate culture. Further aspects include comprehensive planning processes, cooperation with external partners, proper handling of data interfaces, interdisciplinary communication, an adaptable organizational structure and data security.

The paper is limited to German manufacturing enterprises and should be transferred to other industries and countries.

The study supports managers to effectively implement Industry 4.0 within their organizations and consequently benefit from Industry 4.0 and derives recommendations for future research.

The paper is among the first to give specific and concrete examples for lessons learned from Industry 4.0 implementation, directly obtained from industrial application.

The purpose of this paper is to establish criteria for evaluating strategic partners in a network of logistics service providers (LSPs) to show how analytical network process (ANP) can be used to identify the weights of these criteria on a case-specific basis, and to investigate whether the ANP model can be used as a starting point to evaluate strategic partners for other LSP networks.

Based on a literature review of vertical cooperation, the authors develop an overview of criteria for the evaluation of partners in a network of LSPs. The authors then apply ANP at LSP1 to validate the criteria, identify weights for these criteria and to validate model outcomes. Furthermore, the authors investigate whether the ANP model developed for LSP1 can be applied to another LSP with similar characteristics (LSP2). In-depth interviews are used to draw conclusions on the modeling approach and the model outcomes.

The research shows that evaluation criteria for partners in vertical partnerships between shippers and LSPs are applicable to LSP partners in horizontal partnership networks. The ANP model with criteria weights provides a good starting point for LSPs to customize the evaluation framework according to their specific needs or operating environments.

Limited research is available on evaluating LSP partners in horizontal partnerships. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first to bring forward horizontal LSP partner evaluation criteria to develop an ANP model for LSP partner evaluation and to apply this to two cases, and to provide a starting point for evaluating partners in similar horizontal LSP networks.

The review aims to facilitate a broader understanding of platform opening and cooperation and points out potential research directions for scholars.

This study searches Web of Science (WOS) database for relevant literature published between 2010 and 2021 and selects 86 papers for this review. The selected literature is categorized according to three dimensions: the strategic choice of platform opening and cooperation (before opening), the construction of an open platform (during opening) and the impact of platform opening and cooperation (after opening). Through comparative analysis, the authors identify research gaps and propose four future research agendas.

The study finds that the current studies are fragmented, and a research system with a theoretical foundation has not yet formed. In addition, with the development of platform operations, new topics such as platform ecosystems and open platform governance have emerged. In short, there is an urgent need for scholars to conduct exploratory research. To this end, the study proposes four future research agendas: strengthen basic research on platform opening and cooperation, deeply explore the dynamic evolution and cutting-edge models of platform opening and cooperation, analyze potential crises and impacts of platform openness and strengthen research on open platform governance.

This is the first systematic review on platform opening and cooperation. Through categorizing literature into three dimensions, this article clearly shows the research status and provides future research avenues.

The climate crisis presents a global threat. Research shows the necessity of joint communication efforts across different arenas—media, politics, business, academia and protest—to address this threat. However, communication about social change in response to the climate crisis comes with challenges. These challenges manifest, among others, in public accusations of inconsistency in terms of hypocrisy and incapability against self-declared change agents in different arenas. This increasingly turns public climate communication into a “blame game”.

Strategic communication scholarship has started to engage in this debate, thereby acknowledging climate communication as an arena-spanning, necessarily contested issue. Still, a systematic overview of specific inconsistency accusations in different public arenas is lacking. This conceptual article provides an overview based on a macro-focused public arena approach and decoupling scholarship.

Drawing on a systematic literature review of climate-related strategic communication scholarship and key debates from climate communication research in neighboring domains, the authors develop a framework mapping how inconsistency accusations of hypocrisy and incapacity, that is, policy–practice and means–ends decoupling, manifest in different climate communication arenas.

This framework creates awareness for the shared challenge of decoupling accusations across different climate communication arenas, underscoring the necessity of an arena-spanning strategic communication agenda. This agenda requires a communicative shift from downplaying to embracing decoupling accusations, from mutual blaming to approval of accountable ways of working through accusations and from confrontation to cooperation of agents across arenas.

The purpose of this paper is to explore and test the motivation behind the evolution of China’s vast network of partnerships around the globe since the end of the Cold War.

After combing through 24 types of partnerships with 78 countries, the authors empirically tested four hypotheses using data from Correlates of War and World Bank.

The analysis indicates that China’s choice to build such an elaborate network is not random. On the contrary, it is largely determined by three factors: the need to counter the US pressure; the necessity of maintaining peace and stability along its borders and achieving the long-term goal of modernization.

The research is among the first attempts to comprehensively test the possible motivations behind China’s partnership building efforts and provides a stepping stone for analyzing this important aspect of China’s foreign policy.

This study investigates the effect of strategic internal critical factors on strategic alliance performance in an emerging market, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Multivariate statistical analysis technique Partial Least Square-Squared Equation Model is used for data analysis considering a survey of 260 alliance managers.

Environmental complexity moderates the relationship between strategic internal critical factors and strategic performance. A significant positive effect of strategic internal critical factors on corporation strategic performance was found. It suggests that environment and strategic alliance enable alliance managers and decision-makers to translate alliance strategies and improve the overall organization’s performance outcome, productivity, efficiency, availability of a product and profitability.

The findings disseminate beneficial implications for alliance managers regarding how they can best use their capability to maximize alliance performance. Realizing the antecedents of strategic alliance performance allows a manager to be sensitive about the influent factors and try to improve the alliance performance.

This paper shows how to create associations between interfirm coordination as a framework of new ventures for implementing radical technological change, firm performance in the post-innovation period, industry and firm innovative output.