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Daimler and Renault signed a strategic alliance sharing competencies and technologies. The alliance is about creating platform projects for components of the new cars. Each company has its components to realize. With this alliance Daimler is changing its traditional business model: the company decided to swicht to the production of small car, where Renault has its core busines competencies. This partnership can also bring the German company in contact with the field of the new electric cars, in which Reanult is well advanced. 

A short paper on recent advances in synthetic biology. What are the ethical issues and liability potential when just about any biologist will be able to assemble new life forms starting from basic commercially available components?

One of the interesting elements in Apple's new product line - the iPad tablets - is the fact that the processor is not sourced from suppliers. Developing a microprocessor in-house is not a trivial thing at all, but the integrated nature of the product evidently suggested Apple to make this step in order to optimize performance and - possibly - to keep a stronger grip over a key component, thus avoiding commoditization.

3D visualization is probably going to become a disruptive innovation over the next few years. This is true for movies and TV sets, but also for gaming on both TV-based and hanheld devices. As usual, the question is whether the disruption will be at the level of device makers or for manufacturers of the component (i.e. screen).

Within the next two years, BMW will save 5.2 billion dollars thanks to the agreement with Mercedes for the development and sharing of components not visible to the customer including, for example, air conditioners or window regulator motors. According to Bloomberg agency reported, this target would be the result of a conservative estimate and might even generate a substantial surplus. This result is convincing largely attribute to the new 7 Series, with full sales and first recipient model of joint activities. That kind of odd alliance means the two carmakers are going to share component suppliers, so instead of a two actors alliance it could be considered a three subjects agreement. The third part involved are the common suppliers.

This is another important standards war, though few people mention it. The early entrant, wimax, didn't have the time to gain critical mass, and the latecomer, LTE, seems to have stolen the march. The technologies are  roughly equivalent but - the writer says - LTE is becoming the winner, seemingly because it is endorsed by downstream players (device makers such as Nokia), while wimax is being pushed by upstream ones (component makers such as Intel). This causal relationship is not clear, but nonetheless interesting.

In the past decades, most watchmakers have decided to source core parts from suppliers. This has led to the quasi-monopoly of the component manufacturer ETA, owned by the Swatch group. Now this strategy is backfiring, with ETA creating stricter conditions to its customers, the latter complaining about unfair business practices but fundamentally unable to find alternative strategies. As one executives states, "it's not ETA that has created a monopoly, but others, by not investing".

Nintendo still is a leader in the games console industry. Now it is the turn for portable devices  with 3D screens that do not require the use of glasses. One big question is whether this innovation will be disruptive or not, since 3D screens and games are "modules" that are likely to be available to all competitors.