Andrea Prencipe, Universita Degli Studi G. D'Annunzio Chieti Pescara

Shifting Industry Architecture and the Coordination of Dispersed Capabilities The purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of knowledge integration mechanisms in a context of shifting industry architectures. Whilst conventional wisdom and extant literature suggest that the development of systems integration capabilities is required to successfully coordinate and integrate knowledge and capabilities distributed both within and outside the firm’s boundaries, we argue that the nexus between knowledge integration mechanisms and performance is more subtle. Through the analysis of a sample of integrated solution providers in the IT sector, we show that the effectiveness of knowledge integration mechanisms is dependent upon the type of knowledge bodies that need to be integrated and the product/service life cycle phase in which integration must occur. When knowledge integration must occur ex ante, system integration capabilities are redundant and even counterproductive. Conversely, when knowledge integration must occur in itinere or ex post, the presence of system integration capabilities is fundamental. The results have far reaching implications for the providers of integrated solutions and suggest that these firms should match their solution design strategy with the type of knowledge integration capabilities they possess.