Article on Tensions in Coopetition for Sustainable Innovation

Together with his colleagues Pauline Munten, Joëlle Vanhamme, François Maon, and Valérie Swaen, Adam Lindgreen has a new article out on how to address tensions in coopetition for sustainable innovation. The article is published in Journal of Business Research.

Developing solutions to sustainability challenges requires cooperation among various firms and actors in different industries and sectors (e.g., regulatory authorities, nonprofit organizations). Prior studies investigate sustainability-related coopetition tensions in bilateral relationships; our article instead considers tensions at a broader, value net level and highlights the dark side of business relationships for firms engaged in coopetition. Qualitative analyses, based on interviews with 31 experts from the automotive industry, highlight how innovative efforts to achieve environmental sustainability can generate detrimental environmental and societal impacts. Specifically, we identify four sustainable innovation tensions, at the firm level and the value net level. The authors outline the aggregate economic, social, and ecological sustainability impacts, as well as the critical need for an exhaustive definition of the value net and which factors influence coopetition in sustainability efforts.

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