Today, global IT players -the leading multinational corporations within the information technology (IT) industry -are heavily involved in all sorts of business networks with competitors, suppliers and customers. Improved competitiveness is usually the reason given for the establishment of these networks. However, whether they in fact contribute to an improvement of competitive position depends not only on their strategic benefits but also on the way they are structured. In the case of global players, this refers to the management of the business network as well as to its integration into the corporate global strategy. The objective of this paper is therefore to develop contingencies or reference points for the effective and efficient structuring of business networks. This is done by deriving working hypotheses based on various economic theories and contrasting these with case study findings for selected global IT players.