Donnet & Keast Untapped Channels Untapped channels: Expanding information and knowledge capture for supply chains and SME clusters. Timothy Donnet & Robyn Keast School of Management, Queensland University of Technology Abstract Current trends in strategic management literature urge firms to utilise external relationships for purposes of sustaining competitive advantages. Supply chain management and clusters are independent fields of literature that focus heavily on the tenets of knowledge management, innovation and technology transfer, both idealising networks of firms that readily utilise relationships and ties for ongoing business success. While the field of strategic management has interrogated processes and relationships between individual firms and within independent networks, there has been little focus on looking beyond the independent firm and network level to consider networks of firms interacting with other networks of firms. This contribution purposefully interrogates the overlap of these two network types through a soft systems approach, delivering elements and drivers that enable these networks to interact with one another. Examining the ways in which information and knowledge are transferred and utilised through these elements shows that each network type has its own distinct advantages in the types of information searched and transferred amongst network member firms. Comparing these advantages shows opportunities for both networks to leverage the knowledge sharing strengths of each other to address their own weakness, and implications are drawn to new ways of utilising relationships for mutual network gain. 16 th January 2008 1