Configuration and Development of Alliance Portfolios: A Comparison of Same-Sector and Cross-Sector Partnerships Roberto Gutie ´rrez 1 • Patricia Ma ´rquez 2 • Ezequiel Reficco 1 Ó Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015 Abstract Management of different types of partnerships plays a decisive role in company performance. Complex business ventures, such as those created to serve low-in- come populations, usually include both cross- and same- sector partnerships. However, the initial diversity featured in these alliance portfolios diminishes as companies take their ventures up to scale. This article develops theoretical propositions about the evolution and configuration patterns of portfolios that include both cross- and same-sector partnerships. Two longitudinal case studies serve to illus- trate the theoretical framework developed for alliance portfolios that include both types of partnerships. Compa- nies that create such portfolios adopt partnership strategies that follow paths also identified in the evolution of port- folios only made up of partnerships with other private firms: i.e., an evolution from adapting to shaping and exploiting strategies. Keywords Alliance portfolios Á Partnership strategies Á Cross-sector partnerships Á Strategic alliances Á BoP markets Introduction Partnerships are credited with providing access to resources and new prospects that can be explored with limited risk and later be exploited (Eisenhardt and Schoonhoven 1996; Hagedoorn and Osborn 1997). 1 Partnerships can also act as buffers and help firms face environmental uncertainties (Powell 1998; Wernerfelt and Karnani 1987). In sum, a firm can improve competitiveness through a pair or network of relationships with other firms (Dyer and Singh 1998). Same-sector partnerships (known in the literature as strategic alliances) are ‘‘interfirm cooperative arrange- ments, involving flows and linkages that use resources and/ or governance structures from autonomous organizations, for the joint accomplishment of individual goals linked to the corporate mission of each sponsoring firm’’ (Parkhe 1993, p. 794). As partnerships between firms become commonplace, research has expanded to study portfolios (Hoffmann 2007; Lavie 2007; Ozcan and Eisenhardt 2009), and to explore their emergence, configuration, and man- agement (Wassmer 2010). Portfolios can be defined as the set of bilateral partnerships maintained by a focal firm (Doz and Hamel 1999). As they came to be seen as sources of competitive advantage, portfolios’ configuration and evo- lution have become strategic issues (Gulati 1998, 1999; Gulati et al. 2000). Since the turn of the century, another strand of research focused on partnerships spanning across sectors emerged (Austin et al. 2004; Berger et al. 2004; Seitanidi and Ryan 2007; Seitanidi and Crane 2009; Selsky and Parker 2005, 2010). Two parallel trends propelled the proliferation of & Patricia Ma ´rquez pmarquez@sandiego.edu Roberto Gutie ´rrez robgutie@uniandes.edu.co Ezequiel Reficco e.reficco@uniandes.edu.co 1 Universidad de los Andes, Bogota ´, Colombia 2 University of San Diego, San Diego, CA, USA 1 While these authors—and a good portion of the literature—use the term ‘‘alliances,’’ in this article we will use ‘‘partnerships‘‘ instead. We will only keep the term when referring to ‘‘alliance portfolios.’’ 123 J Bus Ethics DOI 10.1007/s10551-015-2729-7