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

A striking feature of financial service activities during the past few decades is that the financial transactions essential to the operation of the 'real' economy has become increasingly dwarfed by speculative activity.

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.

The primary driver of final consumer demand is, of course, the level of disposable income.