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Comment by Editor's Choice on January 6, 2011 at 17:50

Drafting a report recently, I wrote 'long gone are the days when "partnership' was just something between a company and a local NGO" - a generalisation that was quizzed by one of the reviewers.  If I had had this new report to hand then, nothing else would have been needed for the quiz answer.   The examples detailed in this report illustrate just how diverse - and often ambitious - modern partnerships are.   There are examples of companies from different sectors collaborating, such as Pfeizer and Vodafone for mobile health technology, competitors from the same sector working together, such as Nestle, Cadbury and Mars tackling root causes of child labour, and business working with governments on major development challenges, such as barriers to cross-border trade in West Africa and East Africa.  As the report notes, we are seeing more partners, tackle more complex issues, in more innovative ways.   One thing appears constant: the principle that partners each contribute their expertise and through collaboration leverage results they could not achieve alone.  And so the report calls for partnership match-making networks and platforms to help this happen faster and wider.  Once this happens, the partnership genie will certainly be let loose, and who knows what ambitious results will be achieved.