BUILDING COOPERATION IN A COMPETITIVE INDUSTRY - SEMATECH AND THE SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY

This article presents the results of a grounded theory analysis of obs ervation, interview, and archival data collected at SEMATECH, a resear ch, development, and testing consortium in the semiconductor manufactu ring industry. Three core categories of events and behaviors are descr ibed: (1) the factors underlying the consortium's early disorder and a mbiguity, (2) the development of a moral community in which individual s and firms made contributions to the industry without regard for imme diate and specific payback, and (3) the structuring that emerged from changing practices and norms as consortium founders and others devised ways to foster cooperation. We interpret results in terms of complexi ty theory, a framework for understanding change that has not been prev iously explored with detailed empirical data from organizations.