Partner-based opportunism, interface structure, and performance efficiency in upstream and downstream alliance activities contexts

Musarra, Giuseppe, Bowen, Karen Tejedor, Robson, Matthew J. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8642-9980 and Spyropoulou, Stavroula 2021. Partner-based opportunism, interface structure, and performance efficiency in upstream and downstream alliance activities contexts. Industrial Marketing Management 93 , pp. 76-89. 10.1016/j.indmarman.2021.01.003

PDF - Accepted Post-Print Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives. Download (527kB)

Abstract

Few alliance studies have theorized that opportunism’s effect on performance efficiency is contingent on other factors. Our study posits that alliance partner size and no end-point serve as interface structure mechanisms that condition the efficiency outcomes of partner-based opportunism in alliances. We argue that the direct effect of partner-based opportunism, and the moderation effects of alliance partner size and no end-point, differ according to the alliance activities context (i.e., upstream vs. downstream). Our hypotheses were tested using a survey of 361 alliances. We observe that partner-based opportunism is indeed associated with performance inefficiencies. Further, while alliance partner size has a nonsignificant moderating effect, no end-point has a positive moderating effect, on the relationship between partner-based opportunism and efficiency; that is, the negative link becomes less negative for no end-point alliances. We find that the negative performance relevance of partner-based opportunism remains significant among upstream alliances, but drops to nonsignificance for downstream ones. We show that alliance partner size has a negative moderating effect on the link partner-based opportunism to performance efficiency among downstream, but not upstream, alliances. Lastly, we find that the positive moderating effect of no end-point is significant among upstream, but not downstream, alliances. Our results generate important implications for managers’ efforts to design and govern alliances.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Schools > Business (Including Economics)
Publisher:	Elsevier
ISSN:	0019-8501
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	18 January 2021
Date of Acceptance:	2 January 2021
Last Modified:	16 Nov 2024 07:15
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/137769

Citation Data

Cited 9 times in Scopus. View in Scopus. Powered By Scopus® Data

Actions (repository staff only)

Edit Item