رقابت از طریق اتحادیه ها: استراتژی رقابتی در بازار مخابرات جهانی

This article is the first and the qualitative section of a two-part strategy research project which examines the state of the global telecommunications market and assesses the business factors and environmental variables such as country/regional economic profiles, political systems and regional alliances, that influence strategic directions of firms in the converging global telecommunications market. The article specifically investigates the forces contributing to the globalization of telecommunications services, major telecommunications strategies and strategic alliances in the global market, and factors that may have contributed to the outcome of these alliances.

Since the early 1990s, Europe and the United States have witnessed multiple mergers involving leading telecommunications companies. The marriages of AT&T with TCI and Media One, MCI with WorldCom, and Vodafone with Mannesman set the stage of a rapidly changing global telecommunications market as players such as British Telecom (BT), AT&T, and DoCoMo acknowledged their plans to build competitive advantages in the world market through combinations with other companies. Other strategic partnerships between major telecommunications operators from North/South America, Europe, and Asia are forming almost daily, although the pace has slowed since the decrease in telecommunication and Internet stock prices tightened capital markets in late 2000 (Rosenbush, 2001).1 The trend towards alliances goes beyond the traditional wireline telecommunications sector. We are also seeing mergers between major wireless players such as Vodafone and Airtouch, between old and new media companies such as Time Warner and America Online, and between old and new network companies such as US West and Qwest. We are also seeing partial equity investments in leading e-commerce software makers such as Debis by Deutsche Telekom, and online joint ventures in Internet access services between companies such as MCI WorldCom and Yahoo. The nature of competition today in the global telecommunications industry seems to center around market activities that aim at gaining competitive advantages through strategic combinations of resources and presence in multiple products and geographical areas. This study is the first and the qualitative section of a two-part strategy research project that examines the state of the global telecommunications market and assesses the business factors and environmental variables (e.g., country/region economic profiles, political systems, and regional alliances) that influence the strategic directions of the firms in the converging global telecommunications market. Specifically, this paper investigates the forces that have contributed to the globalization of telecommunications services, the major telecommunications strategies and strategic alliances in the global telecommunications market, and the factors that might have contributed to the outcome of these alliances.

It is not surprising that strategic alliances have been the dominant theme of the global telecoms industry considering the magnitude of product and geographical convergence that has occurred in the last decade. Though many of the forces that have contributed to the first phase of telecom globalization are still present today, there are barriers that may impede the telecom multinationals' growth in this market. We believe that in the next stage of globalization, the integration of competing technologies and the development of standardization that facilitate interoperability between these systems, along with the alignment of goals, information, services, and operations between firms in alliances are the keys to competitive advantages in this technology-driven industry. It is also essential for the current global players to re-examine the market as it continues to attract new competitors. Fig. 2 and Fig. 3 show the countries and companies that participated in the major alliances discussed earlier. Conspicuous by their absence in these global telecommunications businesses are the US Bell Operating Companies (BOCs) (with the exception of Sprint) and NTT. In the US, the BOCs interLATA restrictions have kept them from becoming global carriers. However, recent mergers, alliances, and international investments by SBC and Bell Atlantic have given both companies significant US footprints and meaningful international operations from which they can launch their global businesses. Just recently, NTT was restructured to allow its entry to the global telecoms market. As a start, in 2000, DoCoMo, NTT's wireless unit, invested $9.8 billion in AT&T Wireless (Rosenbush, 2001). Also, the growth of demand for telecom services in markets such as China and many Latin American countries will elevate further the competitive roles of the PTOs from these regions (e.g., China Telecom and Telmex). In sum, we expect the trend of competition through alliances to persist as the telecom multinationals continue to face a globalized marketplace that rewards scale economy, multilateral competition, and seamless delivery of integrated content to the increasingly demanding global telecom customers (Table 4 and Table 5).