Collaborations, Partnerships, Alliances and Consortia

Bringing game-changing innovations forward into the marketplace has never been more important. The challenges involved in accomplishing this objective, however, are many and very complex.

Successfully achieving disruptive, innovative change needs the collective input and involvement from all the relevant elements of business and industry impacted by the change.

The Complex Path to Success in Innovative Change

Figure 1 highlights six elements which represent key contributors and stakeholders that play important individual roles in bringing game-changing innovations to market.
• Regulatory - Regulatory compliance is a gatekeeper for any new technology. The costs involved increasingly exceed what a single organization
can justify.
• Government - Government involvement and funding support is often a necessity when game-changing technology is involved.
• Industry standards - Industry standards are a necessity. When standards exist, having supporting data is a requirement. With game-changing technology, new standards need to be developed so all companies connected to the effort are on the same page.
• Value-chain - Input, involvement, and support from companies that comprise the value-chain are needed.
• Competitors - Active involvement across the competitive landscape is critical when trying to bring game-changing technology to market.
• Innovators and Academia - Represent key sources of creativity that generate and support the work necessary to bring next-generation technology forward to industry.

Collaborations, Partnerships, Alliances and Consortia

The business dynamics involved in commercializing disruptive technology are formidable. The costs and resources necessary to succeed in such an effort have become prohibitive for any one company to try and do it alone.

Furthermore, without the involvement and buy-in from the many stakeholders affected by such a change, the chance for a successful outcome is very small.

Among the formats used to bring companies and organizations together to address issues of common interest are:
• Collaborations
• Partnerships
• Alliances
• Consortiums

Collaborations

Collaborations between two companies are characterized by each having a particular area of expertise that complement or are synergistic with each other.

The objectives for creating a collaborative relationship vary. They may address a particular issue that is affecting future business opportunities in a shared market space. It can be to solve a specific customer or market problem.

Collaborations are often temporary and less formal.

The global focus on sustainability has energized or re-energized companies to consider alternative technologies or processes that are more sustainable. In the coatings industry, an example of this is found in radiation-cured coatings, adhesives, and inks. The value of radcure technology is being increasingly viewed in the light of the total value it brings to industry.
• Reduction or elimination (EB) of solvent use
• Lower energy demand/fossil
fuel usage
• Smaller manufacturing footprint
• Faster process speed, almost instant cure
• Much lower fresh-water usage (no water for EB)

The contributions and creative energies of the entire radcure community can be described as an informal collaboration. Collectively, they are seizing on the opportunity provided by sustainability to innovate in their individual areas of expertise.

Alliances

An alliance is a formal business arrangement when compared to a collaboration. It involves a legal agreement between the companies that defines the rights and responsibilities of each participant. This includes the process for exchanging technical information and protecting the IP of each. It also defines their individual roles for each in joint project activities, financial responsibilities, and equity positions in
the alliance.

Alliances are an effective way for companies with complementary capabilities to accelerate their ability to succeed in a given market space. They can expand the services and or product offerings to key customers while eliminating existing weaknesses. This can include having access to such things as complementary technology, manufacturing capacity, process knowledge, automation expertise, etc.

Partnerships

Partnerships normally involve two or more companies combining their individual resources and knowledge. There is a well-defined, common business goal on which the partnership is based. Each participant owns a piece of the puzzle.

When combined, the partnership delivers a much stronger business position that significantly increases the collective ability of the partnership to reach its goal. The goal of the partnership can be linked to success in penetrating a particular market segment or facilitating innovation in a particular area of technology.

A partnership does require a separate organizational structure to manage it. This often includes items like costs and financial management resources, personnel, manufacturing facilities, and committed R&D resources.

Consortia

A consortium can be characterized as a group of companies that come together by formal agreement to address a significant business issue which could not be accomplished by any one company. A consortia provides a vendor-neutral platform that can facilitate change and advance the state-of-the-art in a particular field.

When the ultimate objective involves game-changing technology, consortiums represent the best way to bring all the business and industry elements together (Figure 1) under one umbrella.

The member companies, which typically include existing competitors, recognize that by accomplishing its purpose, all members will benefit in some manner. They also recognize it will take the collective involvement and expertise from various levels of the value-chain including competitors to devise a workable solution.

• Additive Manufacturing via 3D Printing
The 3D Manufacturing Format (3MF) Consortium is an industry association formed to develop and promote a new full-fidelity file format for 3D printing/additive manufacturing. This consortium came together to rectify the limitations of the existing file formats used in 3D printing.
The objective was to provide a standardized, more capable format that could handle the full range of additive manufacturing technologies from prototyping to production.
The primary goal of 3MF is to establish a standardized and comprehensive date file format that can be used by all entities involved in additive manufacturing. This facilitates scalability and integrates the methodology for prototyping with full scale production.

• The DRX Battery Consortium
Government-supported consortia are sometimes formed to address critical issues that cannot be effectively supported through existing industry infrastructure. Government funding is needed to support the effort. In such circumstances a consortium is able to bring together the university community, relevant institutes, and government-funded laboratories to provide much of the combined expertise needed.
The DRX Battery Consortium is one example. In this case the U.S. Department of Energy wanted to identify a way to reduce or eliminate the use of cobalt or nickel as a cathode material in lithium-ion batteries. The goal of the DRX consortium is to provide the emerging EV market with a lower-cost battery that uses more readily available cathode materials such as manganese or titanium. The objective is to accelerate the timeline for optimizing cathode efficiencies with these alternative materials and accomplish this
objective within a three- to four-year period.

Summary

The challenges confronting innovators when trying to commercialize new technology are formidable. They include the high costs, resources, and access to the relevant industry expertise required to actually accomplish the objective.

For start-ups and entrepreneurial organizations, this mountain is often too high to climb on their own. Collaborating, partnering, or forming an alliance with one of more companies can be a key to accelerating the commercialization effort.

When game-changing technology is involved, it creates the necessity for a wide range of companies and organizations to
work together.

A consortia provides a vendor-neutral platform that can facilitate change and advance the state-of-the-art in a particular field. It represents the best approach to bringing all the business and industry elements together under one umbrella.