Abstract
Coopetition—consisting of concurrent cooperation and competition—mainly focuses on business activities far from the customer, such as research and development. However, coopetition close to the customer, comprised of marketing and sales, remains an under-researched area. Applying grounded theory, we investigate how hotels and platforms (e.g., Expedia.com and Booking.com) pursue coopetition in close customer proximity. Our findings suggest that, contrary to insights from the literature, coopetition is not only competition dominant close to the customer. Rather, coopetition patterns range between cooperation- and competition-dominant approaches, depending on tension levels. Further, in contrast to current views, separating cooperation and competition over time is impossible when episodes of cooperation and competition are short. Instead, hotels utilize multiple spaces (platforms, physical hotels, and direct channels) to isolate the two forces.
•Hotels cooperate and compete with platforms (e.g., Expedia) close to customers.•Coopetition activities vary from cooperation- to competition-dominant approaches.•These approaches depend on the level of tension between hotels and platforms.•It is impossible for hotels to separate cooperation and competition over time.•Instead, hotels separate the forces in different places (physical hotel, platforms).