Factors influencing the success of virtual cooperation within Dutch-Chinese strategic alliances

With the globalization wave taking place, companies are increasingly seeking partnerships to gain and sustain competitive advantages. The rapid development of the Internet has speeded up such processes and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is enabling organizations to be flatter, networked, and more flexible on a global level; and the distance and place are no longer the barriers to expand development, which provides a new way and channel for organizations, especially SMEs both in China and Europe, to gain advantages from cooperation and to create added value. Therefore, the research of how traditional international cooperation sustains and expands business relationships in the age of ‘going virtual’ has been executed. In order to research this phenomenon, International Virtual Alliance is defined as: An electronically-networked cooperation involving companies, from different countries, that envisage mutual benefits by delivering products or services on the basis of common business understandings and a set of agreed goals and standards. The cooperating units provide their respective complementary assets and core competencies. The key concept of this definition is the construction and operation of electronic communication systems.