danish research unit for industrial dynamics druid working paper no ...

29general knowledge about those aspects, they are not able to find a suitable compromisebetween private and collective interests 9 .Comau for example has also a great capacity to combine knowledge and to convert it indifferent cooperations by fixing meta rules producing methodological knowledge which iseasy to transfer in to different contexts. ABB from the other side set down by someorganisational rules rather similar from one cooperation to another but does try enough toadapt rules with different contexts. ABB gives some general principles about the creation ofan "off line" software but this firm is not flexible enough to operate any hybridisation withuser conditions. This impedes some new combinations of knowledge and does not enforceabsorptive capacity for the user.Some others local rules deal more with problems of uncertainty. In order to face difficultiesin technological creation and unexpected constraints, the rule is to continue to invest for theproject at least one year even if the initial results seem not to be very promising. Thisspecific rule has been very useful in the case of the Mercedes Comau agreement becausefirms encounter local problems with the Sindelfingen plant. Equipment required differentunpredictable adaptations. Comau incited its partner to reinvest for one more year and findfinally new ways to design equipment according specific indications during the two lastsmonths. This solution proved to be very innovative and a useful means of exploringknowledge coming from different agreements. This local rule which seems to be trivial isimportant because technological projects often encounter problems of delay and ofadaptation to local conditions. If partners are not able to deal with this uncertainty bychanging the terms of initial contracts engaged at the beginning of the joint venture theyhave be disappointed by the cooperation. In fact partners have to adapt their owncompetence and their requests during the project for supporting this collective work.Without compromises from both sides cooperation is likely to disappoint partners. Thecomplete presentation of assets produced is to be found in the following table.9 For a more global description of private, public and collective knowledge in science, see Cassier andForay, 1996.