ABSTRACT
This chapter presents certain contributions ranging from discussions about the autonomy of networks as juridical institute to investigations of specific liability problems and duties of network participants. The individual company participating in the network must be a company at the point of entering the network and remain a company for the entire duration of the network relation. The fact that all participants in a company network have to be legally independent companies is affirmed without further problems by economic literature even though the prerequisite is not self-evident. In order to ensure the synchronization of three or more participants and to achieve the network aim, the activities of the network companies have to be co-ordinated. The network companies at least partially exchange their economic independence for the co-ordination of their economic activities by means of concerted practices, agreements or the foundation of a corporation in order to implement the network aim through the bundling of resources.
