Innovation - the heart of technological change - is fundamentally a learning process. - Peter Dicken

In the United Kingdom, for example, the sheer overwhelming dominance of London makes it extremely for provincial cities to develop more than a very restricted financial function. London, in that sense, is akin to the notorious upas tree, a fabulous Javanese tree so poisonous that it destroys all life for many miles around itself.

Geographically, the global economy is now multi-polar, as new centres of production have emerged in parts of what had been, historically, the periphery of the world economy. The world is now more accurately described as a 'mosaic of unevenness in a continual state of flux'.

More broadly, strategic alliances are more difficult to manage and coordinate than single ventures; the potential for misunderstanding and disagreement, particularly between partners from different cultures, is great. Certainly many such alliances are short lived.