Yahoo, the Internet company based in Sunnyvale, Calif., has been exploring alliances with Google; the MySpace.com unit of the News Corporation; and the AOL unit of Time Warner.
Other exchanges have explored alliances with the London Stock Exchange, but its chief executive, Don Cruickshank, has said it will remain independent for now.
Former rivals, such as eBay, Yahoo! and Microsoft, are exploring alliances to counter its influence.
Despite his failed takeover bid last year, Ballmer has continued to explore an alliance with Yahoo and its new chief executive, Carol Bartz.
As he has noted, "I didn't pick the moment" to explore an alliance with GM.
Here's what GM missed and, perhaps, what Ford Motor can expect if it were to explore an alliance with Renault and Nissan.
John began to explore an alliance with the French king Philip II, freshly returned from the crusade.
Among future projects the lab hopes to pursue, Dr. Aronson said, is a research alliance with the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and Stony Brook University to explore health and bioenergy issues, but a requested $30 million a year in state funding is pending.
Chrysler is also exploring an alliance with Fiat to bring new small cars, perhaps to include the Fiat 500, to America.
There is evidence that Osama bin Laden sought to bridge the religious divide when it came to terrorist operations by exploring an alliance with the Iranian-backed guerrilla group Hezbollah as early as the mid-1990's.
