PARTNERSHIP AND INNOVATION IN THE LIFE SCIENCES - Innovation in the Biopharmaceutical Industry - page 115

for selecting suitable partners. Brown and Eisenhardt (1995) identify “trust, expe-
rience, appetite, power and influence to see the project through, access to relevant
information and respect for you as a partner” as being important. Hargadon and Sut-
ton (1997) highlight “critical mass, ability to enhance R&D capability and broaden
product ranges, access to new technologies, potential for cost savings and focus on
core competencies” as important factors taken into consideration when partnering.
Managing projects
We note that in partnerships, project management often focuses on assessment of
financial performance, personal performance and development processes (Brown
and Eisenhardt, 1995; Buckley and Chapman, 1998). Also, project success depends
on the ability of the partnering organisations to assess the absorptive capacity of
a firm; balance internal and external investment; make forward-looking decisions;
communicate project goals to avoid inefficiencies and misunderstandings; overcome
the “not invented here syndrome” (where partners are reluctant to support innova-
tions from outside the firm); and rationalise management accounting systems to
provide consistent data (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990; Damanpour, 1991; Brown,
1991; Ali et al. , 1993; Fiol, 1996; Kamien and Zang, 2000; Hargadon, 2003).
Organising for success
The experience of organisations acting as technology brokers suggests that part-
nering is facilitated by fluid organisational structures, flexible work practices, and
communication of a shared sense of purpose and process (Hargadon, 2003).
Key organisational considerations for partnership success include creating the
right environment for effective flow of “sticky” information between partners; estab-
lishing projects with sufficient technological overlap and acceptance of “innovation
values” which allow a positive exchange between partners; overcoming the “not
invented here syndrome” and the reluctance by partners to accept inputs or outputs
of a third party; and selecting a project with sufficient strategic interest to ensure
buy in at the highest level within the firm (Mowery, 1983; Van de Ven, 1993; Klein
and Sorra, 1996; Zeckhauser, 1996; Mowery et al. , 1998).
In addition to the benefits intended directly from the partnership, a firm also
gains unexpected benefits from spillovers: for example, transferring experience from
one product development programme to another. However, a firm also experiences
potential risks when sharing proprietary expertise as ideas and information may leak
between partners (Richardson and Evangelista, 2002; Oxley and Sampson, 2004).
Unanswered questions relate to the optimal duration of the partnership and the
proximity of partnering organisations in the value chain (Devlin and Bleackly, 1988;