Question

Strategic alliances, joint ventures, merger, acquisition – find examples of these strategies. Be sure to define.

Answer 1

Strategic alliance is a business strategy that combines the reosurces of the two or more business entities to pursue common business objectives. In such alliances, each party holds competitive advantage in a field, and the collective effort / resources help the combined aiilance to address the business challenges in better way. The examples ar numerous, such as between apple and IBM which helps the former to help in its venture to capture global enterprise market.

Joint ventures are the entities where an two or more parties combine their reosurces to set up a common business to achieve certain business objectives. These entities remain independent though. An example is an outside company joins hands with a local player to have strategic advantage, such as Google joining hands with NASA to develp google earth.

Mergers happen when two or more entities merge their resources to create a new joint organisation, an entirely new business entity. The example is the big merger of Exxon and Mobil.

acuisitions happen when one company is purchased or acquired by another as a part of its expansion strategy. The example is purchase of Whole food Market by amazon where the former's entirely new customer base would be served by the lightening fast speed of the later, creating a whole new value propoition to the consumers.