Research has indicated that small and medium sized firms (SMEs) play an important role for the growth of economy. However, in order to be able to compete at an international level, most SMEs are bound to work in alliances in order to gather enough knowledge and resources for product and technology development or to be able to penetrate a larger market.

Alliances can be formed with different types of actors (i.e. suppliers, costumers, agents, universities, consultancies) and in the alliance information and knowledge is gathered and created. Information is defined by Kogut & Zander as “knowledge which can be transmitted without loss of integrity” which includes facts, axiomatic propositions and symbols. This knowledge can be categorized as the domain-specific, procedural knowledge or general knowledge.

In the present study a case approach is used to investigate how different types of information and knowledge generated in a distributed product development is integrated to the firm. What methods are used and some conclusions on what methods are more successful for each type of information/knowledge.

Results indicate a very high representation of formal information sharing (server or documents) even if there is a high degree of belief (understanding) among the respondents that personal meetings and continuous information sharing would be better if they had a system for this. Therefore the conclusions should lead to systems that address the above problems.