The phenomenon of coopetition, i.e. cooperation between competing actors, has gained wide ground in strategic management research. The primary focus of these studies is set on inter- firm relationships, highlighting benefits, limits and configurational patterns of cooperative relationships between competing firms. Only a small, emerging group of studies seeks for extending the concept on the intra-firm level, stressing the existence and effects of competition between units which are part of the same organization. This paper contributes to this latter group by investigating the effects of internal coopetition on knowledge and innovation sharing. Based on a qualitative case study of the video game publisher Ubisoft, we analyze the tensions raised by the coopetitive setting and the way they limit knowledge sharing between competing units. We then identify the facilitating role of knowledge broker agents who actively contribute to weakening these tensions and to promoting knowledge and innovation transfer across units.
