In expanding on earlier analyses of the evolution of multinational business that have drawn from concepts of competition and innovation, this study examines the strategies used by British multinationals, between 1870 and 1929, to protect the global reputation of their brands, which were crucial to their survival and success. Even after the passage of new trademark legislation in 1876, enforcement of trademarks remained expensive, and often firms preferred to negotiate, rather than to prosecute violations. Many trademark imitators were based in the newly industrializing countries of the time—the United States, Germany, and Japan—and were part of the British export supply chains as licensees, franchisees, or wholesalers. British firms responded to infringements by lobbying governments, appointing local agents to provide intelligence, and collaborating with other firms.

In Japan, the integrated circuit (IC) industry has led the way technologically for many other manufacturing industries. According to interviews with key persons at NEC, Tōshiba, and Fujitsu, IC firms' codevelopment with calculator and communication equipment companies greatly contributed to the strong competitiveness of the Japanese IC industry. However, the codevelopment between IC suppliers and their customers in the Japanese calculator markets also helps explain why the competitiveness of Japanese IC industry has been weakened since the late 1990s. The interfirm relations between Japanese IC suppliers and customers and its effects were not so simple and one-sided. The case of Japan's IC industry can be applied to other Japanese industries.

The current scholarly consensus argues that business failure results from the misalignment of a company's strategy and its environment. The case of Western Union, however, suggests that a third element—momentum—is also part of the explanation for companies' failures. The weight of historically accumulated systems, skills, and workers constrains the speed with which managers can adapt their strategy to the environment. Momentum stood in the way of Western Union's attempt to place itself at the center of the growing world of computer communications systems.

The introduction of collective and certification marks to U.S. law in 1946 by the Lanham Act has generally been regarded as an innovative and forward-looking step. Yet these marks had been widely used by individual states since the previous century, and international conventions had long been pushing the federal government to enact measures to protect them. Indeed, it may be stranger that the U.S. trademark law of 1905 did not include protection for such marks than that, forty years later, the Lanham Act did. In exploring why the law of 1905 failed to respond to widespread innovation, and why the Lanham Act was celebrated for fulfilling such a long-overdue obligation, this article raises questions about conventionally linear accounts of the development of trademark law and practice.