Drivers of Coopetition in the Plastic and Composites Material Industry

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. Forms of collaboration according to Bengtsson and Kock (1999) Bengtsson and Kock (1999) distinguished four types of horizontal relationships (see Figure 1) that a firm can have with its competitors: (1) cooperation, (2) competition, (3) coexistence, and (4) coopetition. In terms of cooperation, company X makes economic and other exchanges (e.g., information, social links) with company A. This relationship can be formalized via a partnership or alliance, but the two companies do not compete. According to Easton and Araujo (1992), two firms (e.g., firm X and competitor D) are in competition if they pursue the same objectives (e.g., sale of a product/service) and the realization of this objective is controlled by another actor (e.g., a customer). Coexistence between firm X and competitor C occurs when these two firms have no economic exchange, but could have exchanges of social ties and information (Bengtsson & Kock, 1999). Finally, according to Bengtsson and Kock (1999), the collaboration between company X and company B takes the form of coopetition if the two companies cooperate and compete. Coopetition is the focus of the present research given its importance as a type of collaboration. We define coopetition precisely in the next section.

Definition of Coopetition
In the 1980s, Raymond Noorda introduced the term "coopetition" to refer to the cooperation and simultaneous competition pursued by certain companies . The term is a combination of "cooperation" and "competition" (Czakon et al., 2014). According to the literature, this term was popularized through research conducted by Brandenburger and Nalebuff (1996). These researchers used game theory to argue that companies have an interest in collaborating with their competitors to first expand the market or seek new markets, and then compete for market share. In other words, the goal of coopetition is to create more value in the market (called net worth by Brandenburger and Nalebuff, 1996) while competing for the largest share.  Nalebuff & Brandenburger, 1996 "Creating value that you can capture is the central theme in co-opetition". It consists of two opposite elements: 1) competition and 2) collaboration between two or more organizations. Zineldin, 1998 Cooperation and competition at the same time to be more effective. Bengtsson & Kock, 2000 "A dynamic and paradoxical relationship, which arises when two companies cooperate in some areas (such as strategic alliances), but simultaneously compete in other areas" (p. 411) Vapola et al., 2000 "Refers to an active search for opportunities to create value and bargain for maximum value appropriation from the joint effort (Nalebuff & Brandenburger, 1996))" (p. 4) Bonel & Rocco, 2007 "Emphasizes the mixed-motive nature of relationships in which two or more parties can create value by complementing each other's activity" (p. 71) Padula & Dagnino, 2007 "The intrusion of competition in a cooperative game structure" (p. 33) Rusko, 2011 "Emphasizes the simultaneous competition and cooperation between firms" (p. 311) Bouncken & Fredrich, 2012 Combination of two opposite concepts: 1) competition and 2) collaboration.
Della Corte & Sciarelli, 2012 "A coopetitive firm has some cooperation relationships with firms that are, at the same time, competitors in some other markets (Dowling, Roering, Carlin, & Wisnieski, 1996) or mainly in the same market" (p.

369).
Bengtsson & Kock, 2014 "A paradoxical relationship between two or more actors, regardless of whether they are in horizontal or vertical relationships, simultaneously involved in cooperative and competitive interactions" (p. 180) Raza-Ullah et al., 2014 "Materialises by creating an external boundary (via unifying forces) and internal boundaries (via divergent forces)" (p. 189). Ritala et al., 2014 Simultaneously competitive and horizontal collaborative relationship between two or more organizations. Bagdoniene & Hopeniene, 2015 "Refers to the notion that two or more organizations simultaneously cooperate in some activities" (p.

827)
Huang & Chu, 2015 "Refers to cooperation in competition" Coopetition can be intra-firm or inter-firm, (Ritala et al., 2009). Intra-firm coopetition (i.e., within the same firm) can be between project teams, business units, or departments or functions . Coopetition can take place at a local level (local market) or an international level (foreign market). In this research, we focus on inter-firm coopetition, whether for local or international markets, which we simply refer to as coopetition hereinafter.

Antecedents of Coopetition
The antecedents of coopetition are prerequisites, factors, or even determinants that motivate companies to enter into a coopetition relationship. In recent years, significant research has been devoted to the antecedents of coopetition in different industries. Researchers have studied many prerequisites of coopetition at the (1) individual, (2) organizational, (3) network, and (4) environmental level. Individual factors relate to the personality or characteristics of owners, managers, or employees. For example, Geraudel and Salvetat (2014) showed that personality traits influence managers' propensity to cooperate. Specifically, more conscientious managers have a strong propensity to compete, whereas more agreeable managers have a greater propensity to cooperate. Finally, more nervous managers have a low propensity to cooperate. At the organizational level, for instance, a meta-analysis by Wang and Yang (2013) showed that congruence goals and similarity of organizational norms positively influence companies' desire for coopetition. Network factors such as the power of a competitor and the specific demand of a large customer can motivate coopetition (e.g., Tidstrom & Rajala, 2016). Finally, environmental factors such as deregulation, globalization, environmental uncertainty, and geographical proximity have been demonstrated as drivers of coopetition (e.g., Boschma, 2005;Bouncken et al., 2015;Czakon et al., 2014). Many variables moderated the relationship between these antecedents and coopetition: However, Table 2 shows that the prerequisites for coopetition may differ from industry to industry, as well as from country to country. Hence, in this study we conduct exploratory research to identify the prerequisites of coopetition for the plastic and composites industry in Quebec (Canada).

Outcomes of Coopetition
Although coopetition is seen as risky collaboration, a number of studies have shown its benefits for companies in several industries. Table 3 presents the main results of the outcomes regarding coopetition found in the literature. Table 3 shows that the outcomes or results are numerous, and relate to innovation (Basterretxea et al., 2019;Zahoor & Al-Tabbaa, 2020), performance (Zahoor & Al-Tabbaa, 2020), internationalization (Basterretxea et al., 2019), creation of greater value (Crick & Crick, 2016), and creation of new markets (Ritala et al., 2014). However, the relationship between coopetition and its outcomes (e.g., performance) is influenced by several moderating factors that can increase or decrease these outcomes. For example, economic uncertainty positively amplifies the influence of coopetition on performance. Conversely, if the entrepreneurial orientation of the owner or manager is high, the relationship between coopetition and performance is weak.

Drivers, Processes, and Outcomes Model of Coopetition
Various authors (e.g.,  have used the antecedents, processes, and outcomes model (or drivers, process, outcomes) to analyze coopetition. As highlighted by , this model helps to explain (1) why competitors cooperate (i.e., drivers), (2) the coopetition process, and (3) coopetition expectations (outcomes). However, several authors (Zahoor et al., 2020) have emphasized the importance of moderating variables between antecedents and processes, and between processes and outcomes. Therefore, in this study we adopt the antecedents, processes, results, moderators (APRM) model. Zahoor et al. (2020), Figure 2 presents the APRM model of the main variables studied in the literature. As noted above, the factors of the APRM model vary from industry to industry. Furthermore, in the case of competition between members of the plastic and composites industry, we conduct exploratory research to identify the important factors in each component of the APRM model.

Methodology
Prior scholars (ex., Czakon et al., 2020;Kraus et al., 2019) posited the majority of studies in coopetition has chosen qualitative exploratory research. The main reason of this choice is the competitive research is under studied and this method helps to better understand the managers' perception about the drivers of coopetition (Kraus et al., 2019). So, this research adopts exploratory research principles to verify the existence of components of the APRM model that are specific to the plastic and composites industry and not cited in the literature to date. The research also verifies whether certain factors of the APRM model cited in the literature are important for plastic and composites industry companies.
To conduct the exploratory research, we opted for the case studies as recommended by Yin (1989). Indeed, this latter specified that case studies is suitable for complex phenomena exploratory. In particular, we needed included organizations that previously make coopetition and others not yet. So, we approached the managers of one important association of the plastic and composite industry in Quebec for three reasons. First, Canada holds the 6th position in the world for production of plastics and composites, and Quebec is the second-largest province in the composites and plastics industry. Second, globally, this industry has been growing for several years thanks to the increased use of plastics and composite materials in several industrial sectors, including the automotive and recreational vehicle, electronics, medical, and aerospace industries, to name only a few. However, despite this global growth, businesses in the region face several challenges, particularly the increased competition from Asian countries such as China, labor availability, and raw material supply. Finally, some organizations have made coopetition with other members in this association.
We contacted several members of this association, but only eight managers agreed to answer our questions. Nevertheless, the respondent profile provides an interesting sample representing the industry and allowed us to pursue the research work. Table 4 shows the nature of respondent firms. Specifically, we designate each respondent's company as company A, and their company's subject of competition as company X. Each organization represents a case in our research (Miles and Huberman, 2014), because before the managers answered our questions, we asked them to think about a competitor who could be a potential actor in coopetition.
The interview was conducted with the executive manager in each company. Each of them understands what the coopetition is. We asked questions to uncover the antecedents, processes, and outcomes of coopetition. We also asked questions to validate whether certain important factors in the literature (e.g., confidence) were important in the case of the plastic and composites industry. Respondents' answers were coded according to the themes and categories (Miles and Huberman, 2003) in consistent with the literature.
Finally, we used descriptive statistics to compare responses between respondents. The sample comprised:  Three large companies (in terms of gross sales) whose managers have considered engaging in coopetition with small companies;  One manager who has considered engaging in coopetition with a roughly equal company in terms of gross sales;  Four small companies who have considered engaging in coopetition with large companies.

Drivers, Processes, and Outcomes Model of Coopetition
As defined above, coopetition relates to collaboration in activities. Therefore, the question arises as to the activities in which members of the plastic and composites industry want to collaborate. To answer this question, we asked respondents about their willingness to collaborate in critical activities highlighted in the literature.  The data in Table 5 suggest that the respondents have a willingness to collaborate to:  Create new products or product lines;  Share the costs of shipping and/or importing raw materials;  Share information about other competitors;  Share technical expertise on non-exclusive products;  Transmit information that could have an impact on the partner;  Troubleshoot with the partner on non-exclusive products, in order to enable the focal firm to continue to serve its customers in the event of a supply difficulty.
Nevertheless, Table 5 also shows that respondents do not want to collaborate for any activities that are close to the customer, that is: (1) at the sales level, (2) to serve customers, and (3) to share important information about customers/markets. In addition, they are not willing to share long-term or short-term storage costs. Likewise, members are not willing to help another member with unexpected and important issues. Table 6 summarizes the main elements of the APRM model that correspond to the responses of the participants.

APRM Model and Plastic and Composites Industry
Regarding the antecedents of coopetition, respondents expressed various elements, namely:  The difficult and competitive environment that encourages companies to collaborate;  The heterogeneity of resources and skills in the sense that the two companies must have complementary resources and skills. In this regard, one respondent said, "One has the technology and the other the network";  Lack of capacity, meaning that a single company cannot carry out a project;  The strategic positioning of the company. In this regard, one respondent emphasized that, "collaboration must in one way or another lead to the positioning of each of the companies (e.g., innovation)";  The customer's request to form a consortium;  The "win" of each actor in the collaboration. However, this win must be distributed according to the participation rate of each actor. This principle ties in with the concept of fairness expressed in the literature as the antecedent of coopetition. ijbm.ccsenet.org International Journal of Business and Management Vol. 18, No. 4;  At the level of coopetition processes, respondents only noted the process of expanding knowledge about the industry and its evolution.
In terms of coopetition outcomes, the four elements cited by respondents were: (1) improvement, (2) internalization (i.e., conquering new international markets), (3) innovation, and (4) profitability. All of these elements have been cited in the literature (see Table 2).
Finally, in terms of moderating factors, the respondents discussed:  The size of the market: a large market may encourage companies to collaborate, but not a small market. One respondent specified, "Our market is too small to divide the pie";  Challenges and a competitive environment, which encourages companies to collaborate;  The presence of clear agreements (which call for a governance mechanism of coopetition);  The presence of a strong representative body (responsible for networking).
Respondents mentioned two factors not indicated in the literature related to moderating variables and that promote coopetition: (1) the presence of a strong representative body (responsible for the networking), and (2) definition of the fields of activity of each actor to achieve complementarity. These two elements are most likely linked, as the networking organization can help define the complementary fields of activity between members of the association.

Validation of Some Antecedents
In order to validate some important antecedents in the literature that were not mentioned explicitly in the open questions, we asked respondents about the elements that affect the levels of antecedents shown in Figure 2. Table  7 summarizes these elements. Specifically, at the individual level, we assessed the characteristics of the respondents and of the target company of the collaboration.
Furthermore, since, in the case of this research, benevolence refers to the willingness to protect and improve the well-being of others, we considered benevolence at the organizational level as the respondent's perception that the target collaborating company will seek to protect and improve the interests of the respondent's company. In other words, in the case of collaboration, the target collaborating company will be considered benevolent if its managers are seen as people who will make decisions and actions that are in the best interests of the respondent's company.
At the strategic level, we focused on identifying the respondent's perception that their company is quite similar to the target company of the collaboration.
Considering the importance of the relational level in the formation and development of relationships, we verified four elements. The first concerns "reciprocity," defined by Gouldner (1960), one of the first proponents of this concept, as "owed by one partner to the other based on the other's prior behavior" (p. 170). Czakon and Czernek (2016) defined reciprocity as the mechanism for the continuity and development of the actors of coopetition trust. Equity is achieved when the collaborating actor is rewarded according to their participation rate. The relationship refers to the degrees of knowledge and connections with managers of the target company of the collaboration.  Table 7 shows that the scores of the elements (gray color) of the relational level are low, especially at the level of reciprocity (only 32.9%). On the other hand, the scores for items at the individual level are high (e.g., 80% for the characteristics of the respondent) and the scores for the organizational (e.g., 66.3% for benevolence) and strategic (e.g., 68.3% for identification) are also fairly high.

Validation of some collaboration processes
At the process level, the most important and most studied factor in literature is trust. Therefore, we wanted to establish whether the respondent trusted the target company of the collaboration. To show the importance of trust, we asked whether the respondent thought that the target company for the collaboration could make a good business partner.  Table 8 shows the responses obtained from study participants. This table shows that trust in the target company of the collaboration is quite high (61.8%). This result is confirmed by the score for the question "The target company of the collaboration would be a good business partner" (62.5%). These scores show that there is a real possibility of collaboration between two competitors in the association, but only under certain conditions.

Conclusion
The study carried out among members of the association in the plastic and composites industry shows that there is a possibility of collaboration between competing companies for innovation, performance, and internationalization. However, to achieve these collaborations, one must consider the presence of (1) certain antecedents, (2) trust, and (3) certain moderating variables (identified in red in Figure 3).
At the background level, the research indicates that there is work to be done in terms of the relationship between members. In this regard, the control mechanism suggested that eliminating tensions between members may help establish guidelines for the fairness of the collaboration. Likewise, the role that the association can play in fostering networking among members can also considerably reduce mistrust among them.
The results of this research show that respondents do not want to collaborate on any activities that are close to the customer. These findings agree with those cited in the literature to date. Indeed, research by Bengtsson and Kock (2000) in two countries and three industries, namely Sweden (brewing industry, rubber coating industry) and Finland (dairy industry), showed that firms compete in activities that are close to customers and cooperate in activities that are far from customers. To this end, several activities can be the subject of collaboration, including: (1) sharing the costs of shipping and/or importing raw materials, (2) sharing of information on other competitors, (3) sharing technical expertise on non-exclusive products, (4) transmission of information that could have an impact on the partner (coopetitor), and (5) troubleshooting for the partner by providing non-exclusive inputs, in order to enable it to serve its customer. Figure 3. Elements of the APRM model identified from research with members of the association

Theoretical and Managerial Implications
From the theoretical perspective, this study adds at least three contributions. First, our study reviews existing literature on coopetition and updates the APRM model of Zahoor et al. (2020). Second, this research is the first to show that some antecedents, processes, and outcomes in the plastic and composites industry are similar to those of other industries, while other factors are different (see Figure 3). Finally, in addition to the APRM model, we explore activities that can be the subject of coopetition. Our results reveal that respondents did not want to collaborate in activities that are close to the customer (e.g., selling activities, sharing important information about customers/markets).
From a managerial perspective, considering the literature review and the research results we can make seven recommendations, although these results need to be confirmed by all members of the association of the plastic and composites industry. These recommendations include the following: 1. Strengthen the relationship between association members. This relationship can greatly improve the willingness to collaborate among members. The leaders of the association, including the board of directors and CEO, can play an important role, through the programming of networking activities.
2. Create a think tank led by the director general to identify activities or areas of complementarity between members of the association.
3. Set up collaboration analysis committees in certain activities of the value chain, such as R&D and logistics activities (costs of shipping and/or importing raw materials).
4. Set up a collaborative competitive intelligence watch system that transmits information to members.
5. Implement legal guidelines to frame the distribution of exchanges between employees.
6. Create a committee to resolve disputes or disagreements between collaborating members within the association.
7. Identify international markets and members who can cooperate in each of these markets.

Limitations and Future Research
Although the results obtained through this research are interesting, it has one important limitation: it is exploratory research whose results are based on a limited number of respondents. Thus, the results cannot be generalized to all members of the plastic and composites industry in Quebec or Canada. Therefore, future research is encouraged to validate and enrich our study.