Effect Of Geographical Proximity And Cognitive Proximity On The Strategic Alliance Partner Selection Based On SIENA Model

With the vigorous development of knowledge-based economy, innovation has become the core competitiveness of enterprises.Strategic alliance not only is the latest cooperation way of the enterprise, but also is the leading organization mode in the innovation network of the enterprise at present.Previous academic which research on strategic alliance partner selection is mainly around the evaluation index system of the strategic alliance partner selection, so the previous research is lack of the evolution analysis about the dynamic alliance, that rarely choose from the dynamic perspective to quantitatively analyze about the influential factors of the strategic alliance partner selection. The subject of multidimensional proximity which is put forward by the French School of Proximity Dynamics provides a new view to us for the research on the strategic alliance partner selection, so far, most of the research at home and abroad is broadly discuss the effect of the multidimensional proximity in the innovation of the enterprise or industry, but the research on the influencing mechanism and the quantitative analysis of the multidimensional proximity for the strategic alliance partner selection is quite scarce.Based on the existing research which is done by the research group, this paper firstly sorts out the related literature at home and abroad, clearly defines the concepts about the geographical proximity and cognitive proximity, analyses the impact of geographical proximity and cognitive proximity on the choice of the strategic partner,and accordingly puts forward several hypothesis.Then, with eight of the China Industry Technology Innovation Strategic Alliances as the research object, based on the data of 91 IT companies from 2009 to 2013, this paper creatively uses the SIENA model which is one of the Social Network Analysis,makes the empirical research on the influencing mechanism of strategic alliance partner selection.Through theoretical analysis and empirical test, the important conclusions show:(1) geographic proximity helps the establishment of the strategic alliance between the enterprises, especially when the enterprises are different in proportions, geographical proximity has a greater impact in the process of the strategic alliance partner selection;(2) cognitive proximity has significantly positive influence on the choice of alliance partners, regardless of the difference in proportions between the enterprises,especially when they are both in small-scale, the enterprises will pay more attentionon the role and impact of the cognitive proximity in the process of building alliances;(3) cost factor is one of the important factors of the strategic alliance partner selection,and it reduces the possibility to establish the alliance relationship;(4)the enterprise which has a stronger absorptive capacity is more inclined to choose the establishment of the strategic alliance relationship;(5)the enterprise scale has effect on the establishment of the alliance, and it avoids the large-scale enterprises to establish strategic alliance with other large-scale enterprises, but the small-scale enterprises tend to have the alliance relationship with other enterprises, especially when they are in small-scale, both of the enterprises will be more actively to build alliances.Finally, based on the empirical results, several countermeasures and suggestions are put forward, which is in favor of the strategic alliance.