Very true. It's not even that they don't work. It's that they seldom actually get off the ground. And, yep, it's usually some point along the integration path w

Very true. It's not even that they don't work. It's that they seldom actually get off the ground. And, yep, it's usually some point along the integration path where it dies a silent death. If a company has a defined (preferably proven) partnership program that allows other companies to "attach", there's an outside shot of at least getting underway. But, if the partnership is novel and the product of a conversation along the lines of "Hey, we have synergy. Why don't we X?", then the partnership is pretty much toast. I've lived it too many times.