Strategy, structure and performance issues of pre-competitive R&D consortia: insights and lessons learned from SEMATECH

This paper utilizes documentary and primary source research to study the evolution of cooperative research and development in the semiconductor industry, beginning with SEMATECH in the late 1980s and continuing to the present with numerous government-university-industry (GUI) research partnerships. The increase in collaborative activities is viewed as one source of the renewed global competitiveness of the US semiconductor industry. By studying the mechanisms by which SEMATECH facilitated industry-wide collaboration, and the extension of that collaboration to include government laboratories and universities, this paper identifies critical features of collaboration in the semiconductor industry which are relevant to the management of partnerships in other industries. The implications of these findings are then developed into potential "lessons learned" for companies, universities and government agencies which are engaged in similar research partnerships.