Collaboration Breadth Research Articles

Effect of innovation voucher-based collaboration on high-tech SMEs’ innovation: the moderating role of knowledge stock

ABSTRACT Innovation voucher is an “innovation currency” issued by the government to subsidize high-tech small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to purchase services from external knowledge providers. Based on the knowledge-based view, this study examines the effect of the breadth and depth of innovation voucher-based collaboration on exploratory innovation and exploitative innovation. We use a sample of 865 high-tech SMEs that received innovation voucher support in Shanghai from 2019 to 2020. The results demonstrate that collaboration breadth is beneficial to SMEs’ exploitative innovation, and knowledge stock plays a positive moderating role in the relationship; while collaboration depth is detrimental to SMEs’ exploratory innovation, and knowledge stock negatively moderates the effect. This study adds empirical evidence to the role of innovation voucher cooperation in promoting innovation among high-tech SMEs, and it is an important guide for high-tech SMEs to carry out innovation activities in the context of innovation voucher policy.

Collaborating for innovation: The inhibiting role of constraints

There is a growing recognition that firms increase their collaboration breadth by opening their boundaries to more innovation partners, sourcing and integrating complementary knowledge, skills, and resources and, in turn, improving their innovation performance. However, not all firms benefit equally from collaboration breadth. We argue that the literature has not considered important contingency factors that can mitigate such benefits. This paper enhances understanding of the relationship between collaboration breadth and innovation performance by contending, and empirically confirming, that the magnitude and direction of this association depend on the type of constraints the firm faces. Drawing on organizational learning theory, it is argued that firms encountering financial, knowledge, and institutional innovation constraints will compromise the effects of their openness. The empirical findings suggest that innovative firms face challenges balancing trade-offs between a broad collaboration network and high financial, knowledge, and institutional constraints.

Big-data analytics capability, value creation process, and collaboration innovation quality in manufacturing enterprises: A knowledge-based view

Big-data analytics capability (BDAC) is crucial for the value creation process and collaboration innovation of manufacturing enterprises. Based on the knowledge-based view, this study aims to explore the relationship between BDAC, the value creation process (collaboration breadth and collaboration depth), and collaboration innovation quality while considering the contingency of technology risk. On the basis of 2,366 firm-year observations in 896 Chinese manufacturing enterprises between 2015 and 2022, the empirical results indicate that BDAC positively affects collaboration breadth and collaboration depth. Additionally, both collaboration breadth and collaboration depth mediate the relationship between BDAC and collaboration innovation quality, and technology risk weakens the positive effect of BDAC on collaboration depth. Our findings contribute to literatures on BDAC, technology risk and collaborative innovation by introducing knowledge-based view into collaborative innovation, and provide managerial implications for manufacturing enterprises and government policy-making.

How Do Heterogeneous Networks Affect a Firm's Innovation Performance? A Research Analysis Based on Clustering and Classification.

Based on authorized patents of China's artificial intelligence industry from 2013 to 2022, this paper constructs an Industry-University-Research institution (IUR) collaboration network and an Inter-Firm (IF) collaboration network and used the entropy weight method to take both the quantity and quality of patents into account to calculate the innovation performance of firms. Through the hierarchical clustering algorithm and classification and regression trees (CART) algorithm, in-depth analysis has been conducted on the intricate non-linear influence mechanisms between multiple variables and a firm's innovation performance. The findings indicate the following: (1) Based on the network centrality (NC), structural hole (SH), collaboration breadth (CB), and collaboration depth (CD) of both IUR and IF collaboration networks, two types of focal firms are identified. (2) For different types of focal firms, the combinations of network characteristics affecting their innovation performance are various. (3) In the IUR collaboration network, focal firms with a wide range of heterogeneous collaborative partners can obtain high innovation performance. However, focal firms in the IF collaboration network can achieve the same aim by maintaining deep collaboration with other focal firms. This paper not only helps firms make scientific decisions for development but also provides valuable suggestions for government policymakers.

Your innovation or mine? The effects of partner diversity on product and process innovation

AbstractDespite a fundamental revolution in digital technology, along with an ancillary reduction in the cost of transmitting knowledge, the innovation literature on knowledge collaboration continues to hold on to the spatial localization of knowledge collaboration as a truism. Drawing on the open innovation literature and knowledge‐based view of firm innovation, this study explores key boundary conditions affecting the relationship between research and development (R&D) collaboration breadth, and product and process innovation. Using a large‐scale survey consisting of 25,813 observations of 14,784 firms in the United Kingdom during 2004–2020, we demonstrate that the breadth of knowledge collaboration with regional, national, and international partners directly affects product and process innovation. However, this relationship depends on the geographical location of the collaboration partner, the type of partner, and the firm's absorptive capacity. We found diminishing marginal returns to knowledge collaboration breadth for regional partners in product innovation, and an inverted U‐shaped relationship in R&D collaboration breadth with regional partners for process innovation and for national and international partners for product and process innovation. While investment in digital technologies only shifts the curve upwards, it is unlikely to change the direction of the relationship between R&D collaboration and a type of innovation outcome. On the contrary, an increase in the share of science, technology, engineering, and math graduates enables firms to leverage the negative effect of R&D collaboration breadth nationally and specifically for process innovation. Investment in digital technology and human capital increases absorptive capacity and reduces the transaction costs associated with over‐search and limited managerial capabilities and resources.

The impact of R&D effort on business model innovation: Evaluating chain mediation through collaboration breadth and depth.

Drawing on a novel theoretical framework, we explored the impact of research and development (R&D) effort on business model innovation via external collaboration breadth and collaboration depth in sequence. We empirically analyzed a sample of 94 Chinese innovative enterprises by applying hierarchical regression analysis and chain mediation analysis. The results indicate that R&D effort positively influences business model innovation. The influencing mechanism is that R&D effort positively affects external collaboration breadth, which in turn positively stimulates external collaboration depth, and ultimately benefits the implementation of business model innovation. Therefore, the breadth and depth of external collaboration play a chain-mediating role. The study develops a new framework for understanding the relationship between R&D effort, external collaboration, and business model innovation. It combines enterprises' internal behavior (R&D) and external behavior (collaboration) to establish an inside-out mechanism for predicting business model innovation. It enriches the theory of business model innovation. It also provides insights for managers and governments to optimize policies in innovation-driven development.

R&D COLLABORATION BREADTH AND FAMILY-FIRM INNOVATION EFFICIENCY: THE ROLE OF FAMILY MANAGEMENT AND GENERATIONAL STAGE

This paper examines the relationship between R&D collaboration breadth and innovation efficiency within family firms. Based on the socioemotional wealth approach and recognising that family firms constitute a rather heterogeneous group, we study family firms’ differences in the way of addressing the R&D collaboration breadth-innovation efficiency link, taking into account family management and the generational stage. Using a panel dataset of 424 manufacturing family firms during the 2007–2016 period, we find significant differences across family firms in the translation of gains from R&D collaboration breadth into innovation efficiency. Specifically, our findings reveal that family firms with higher levels of family management and in first generational stage weaken the R&D collaboration breadth – innovation efficiency link.

Impact of university-industry collaborative research with different dimensions on university patent commercialisation

ABSTRACT The purpose of the paper is to investigate the impact of university-industry collaborative research with different dimensions on university patent commercialisation and offer suggestions to promote patent commercialisation. University-industry collaborative research is measured by the university-industry collaborative patent application. Collaboration breadth and depth are defined. The theories about the impacts of the collaboration breadth and depth on university patent commercialisation are analysed and the hypotheses are proposed accordingly. We explore the impacts by negative binomial regression with the panel data set constructed from the patent data of the ‘double first-class’ universities in China during 2015–2017. Results show that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between the collaboration breadth and the university patent commercialisation. Nevertheless, the collaboration depth has no impact on university patent commercialisation. And surprisingly, the interaction of breadth and depth shows a negative impact on it. Suggestions are offered that universities should avoid collaborating with industry inordinately and pay attention to balance breadth and depth of the collaboration with industry, improving the quality of the collaboration and promoting patent commercialisation.

An investigation on the effect of inter-organizational collaboration on reverse logistics

Despite the popularity of reverse logistics in literature, the effect of different collaboration types on the likelihood to introduce reverse logistics innovation has been under-investigated. Hence, this article explores the impact of domestic collaboration with competitors, customers, suppliers, research institutions, and the breadth of collaboration on a firm's reverse logistics innovation. Four hypotheses - grounded on institutional, resource dependence, and absorptive capacity theories – are tested through generalized structural equation modelling analyses on a longitudinal sample of German firms. The results show a positive impact of vertical collaboration, horizontal collaboration, and collaboration with research institutions on the likelihood to introduce reverse logistics innovation. In contrast, collaboration breadth has a negative impact on reverse logistics, an unexpected and surprising result for the innovation management literature. The article offers recommendations to practitioners as to which partners are more likely to increase the odds of introducing reverse logistics innovation and demonstrates that – to such an aim - firms should select a limited number of partners, identifying the ones that suit their needs the most.

The Role of Collaboration Breadth Attributes in Research Project and Innovation: The Example of National Funded Projects in China

Collaboration is regarded as an effective approach to improve the efficiency of research resources and reduce risks in innovation activities. Collaboration breadth is an important feature of collaborative extent. Therefore, it is necessary to analyse its role between R&D subsidy and innovation and to explore its direct and indirect ties to innovation. The paper is based on government-funded research projects, and the results show that R&D subsidy and collaboration breadth of organizations have positive direct effect on innovation output. Meanwhile, R&D subsidy has positive effect to collaboration breadth. However, the linkage of collaboration breadth of researchers on innovation output is uncertainty. That is, the direct effect is positive, while the indirect effect is negative. It may suggest that collaboration breadth of researchers and innovation output may be affected by other factors, such as knowledge sharing or diffusion. Our contribution is to extend the theory of collaboration breadth and to suggest discussion of the role of knowledge in collaboration breadth.

INTER-ORGANISATIONAL COLLABORATION AND BUSINESS MODEL INNOVATION: THE JOINT MODERATING EFFECTS OF ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY AND COLLABORATION DEPTH

Informed by the knowledge-based theory of the firm, the study explores how internal absorptive capacity and external inter-organisational collaboration jointly promote business model innovation (BMI). Drawing on the relevant existing literature, a model linking collaboration breadth, collaboration depth, absorptive capacity, and BMI was constructed and tested. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis of the results of a questionnaire-based survey of 317 senior managers in manufacturing firms revealed that both collaboration breadth and collaboration depth are positively related to BMI. Collaboration depth has no significant moderating effect on the collaboration breadth–BMI relationship, and absorptive capacity has no significant moderating effect on relations between BMI and collaboration breadth or collaboration depth. However, the joint moderating effects of absorptive capacity and collaboration depth on the collaboration breadth–BMI relationship were positively significant. These results have a number of implications for research on BMI and innovation management and for the development of knowledge-based theory.

Appropriability mechanisms for manufacturing and service firms: the contingencies of openness and knowledge intensity

Conventional wisdom argues that appropriating returns from innovation requires protection mechanisms. However, there will be limits to the effectiveness of formal and informal appropriability mechanisms for innovation performance. Their effectiveness will be contingent on the nature of the knowledge that firms are trying to protect and the openness of their innovation strategy (sharing knowledge while attempting to protect knowledge is known as the ‘paradox of openness’). Do these boundary conditions apply to both manufacturing and service firms equally though? Analyzing data from the UK Community Innovation Survey, this study provides evidence for a continuum – from discrete product manufacturing firms, whose products rely heavily on codified, explicit knowledge and for which formal methods are strongly associated with innovation performance, to knowledge‐intensive service firms, which tend to rely more on complex tacit knowledge and for which innovation is linked to informal, not formal, appropriability. The findings show that the paradox of openness is a limited problem for service firms. The benefits of collaboration for innovation performance outweigh any reduction in the effectiveness of appropriability. For manufacturers, the benefits of collaboration disappear with high formal appropriability, and thus, discrete product manufacturers, contrary to conventional wisdom, may find it beneficial to reduce collaboration breadth and invest in informal appropriability mechanisms. Knowledge‐intensive servitized manufacturers find formal methods effective but only with no or minimal collaboration.

Heterogeneity in industry–university R&D collaboration and firm innovative performance

University–industry R&D collaboration is a key driver of participating firms’ technological capability. However, there is still debate on the determinants of a firm’s innovation performance, especially in relation to the characteristics of collaboration and organizational slack. We lay the foundation for our theoretical framework by establishing testable hypotheses on the effects of the characteristics of university–industry collaboration and organizational slack on the innovation performance of participating firms. Based on a panel data of 2914 firm-year cases for the top 200 U.S. R&D firms, estimates obtained from quantitative techniques produce consistent results and support our predictions. Collaboration breadth, network centrality, unabsorbed slack, collaboration experience and collaboration proactiveness are associated with innovation performance. Moreover, a firm’s higher absorbed slack exerts a negative influence on innovation performance. The managerial implications and future research directions are discussed.

Firm heterogeneity, appropriability, and innovation collaboration

ABSTRACT Using data from both the 2nd Taiwan Innovation Survey and Taiwan Economic Journal, this study incorporates capabilities and governance perspectives to explore innovation collaboration strategies employed by firms with distinct innovation strengths. Consistent with prior research, this study confirms a concave relationship between firm appropriability strength and innovation collaboration breadth. Further, the results show that firms engaged in product innovation are less open to innovation collaboration while process innovation firms are more open to collaborative innovation. The analysis also provides evidence that the effect of appropriability strength on openness is contingent on innovation capabilities. Specifically, firms engaged in product innovation show a convex, rather than concave relationship between appropriability strength and openness to innovation collaboration. This study contributes to our understanding of the relationship between appropriability and openness to innovation collaboration, showing that the limitations of appropriability on openness are less severe for product innovation firms.

Implementing Open Innovation in Research and Technology Organisations: Approaches and Impact

Research and development organisations (RTOs) are at the heart of innovation systems. They help to connect innovation system actors to foster industrial innovation. Due to this intermediary role, they act as paradigmatic open innovation (OI) actors. In this context, RTOs need to balance their knowledge stocks and flows, while assuring their own innovation capabilities and positively impacting the innovation system they influence. Thus, RTOs need to develop collaboration approaches that support their own performance while increasing their capabilities and not threatening their competitive advantages derived from their knowledge stock. In this study we extend the OI research to research organisations analysing their OI approach and the impact on its own performance, developing a new framework for OI study in RTOs using a partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) approach. The research, based on a sample of Spanish RTOs, arises two substantive conclusions. First, an increased number of collaboration partners (collaboration breadth) and the use of a variety of OI practices have a strong impact on RTOs’ overall performance (scientific, transference, and economic results). Second, RTOs need to foster their aperture and promote an active management to benefit from collaborating partners, whereas managers should pay special attention to questions related to the protection and management of intellectual property when promoting the use of different OI practices. Both results also emphasise the importance of managing firms’ knowledge flows in the implementation of OI in RTOs.

Dealing with intellectual property (IP) landmines: Defensive measures to address the problem of IP access

Intellectual property (IP) rights have become an important strategic battleground, in which IP owners increasingly build barriers that impede firms from operating in the marketplace. Although research has examined property preemption as one approach to defend against being blocked by others’ IP, a broader palette of defensive IP measures to address problems of missing access to external IP has received less scrutiny. In quantitative analyses of a representative survey of German firms, we find that key firm-level attributes—firm scope, innovation expenses, product innovation, collaboration breadth, and use of patents—are associated with a need to use such defensive IP measures. We also examine the firm-level attributes associated with a firm’s choice among eight possible types of strategies for IP defense, and how certain types of defensive IP measures are systematically interrelated in use. Qualitative interviews with seventeen intellectual property practitioners complement, and help to interpret, our quantitative findings. Implications for future research, and for managers and policymakers are discussed.

Dealing with Intellectual Property (IP) Landmines: Defensive Measures to Address the Problem of IP Access

Intellectual property (IP) rights have become an important strategic battleground, in which IP owners increasingly build barriers that impede firms from operating in the marketplace. Although research has examined property preemption as one approach to defend against being blocked by others’ IP, a broader palette of defensive IP measures to address problems of missing access to external IP has received less scrutiny. In quantitative analyses of a representative survey of German firms, we find that key firm-level attributes — firm scope, innovation expenses, product innovation, collaboration breadth, and use of patents — are associated with a need to use such defensive IP measures. We also examine the firm-level attributes associated with a firm’s choice among eight possible types of strategies for IP defense, and how certain types of defensive IP measures are systematically interrelated in use. Qualitative interviews with seventeen intellectual property practitioners complement, and help to interpret, our quantitative findings. Implications for future research, and for managers and policymakers are discussed.

Abandoning innovation activities and performance: The moderating role of openness

Firms are encouraged to continually initiate innovation activities as part of their new product development processes and to be open to the use of external knowledge sources. Yet, many are abandoned. Openness to external knowledge sources and the experience of abandoning innovation activities are, therefore, becoming a part of an organization’s reality and innovation strategy. In this paper, we aim to explore how the experience of having abandoned an innovation activity can affect innovation performance and the role two key dimensions of openness, external search breadth and formal innovation collaboration breadth, play. Using data from the UK Innovation Survey, we find that the experience of having abandoned an innovation activity leads to improved innovation performance and that this is negatively moderated by the two dimensions of openness. When external search breadth is high, i.e. when an organization engages with a higher number of different types of knowledge sources, the link between abandoning innovation activities and innovation performance weakens. Similarly, when formal innovation collaboration breadth is high, i.e. the breadth of a firm’s formal collaboration relationships is high, the link between abandoning innovation activities and innovation performance also weakens. We conclude by discussing the theoretical and practical implications of our findings.

Cultural prerequisites for participating in open foresight

Companies are increasingly interested in participating in open foresight. However, little is known about the conditions supporting them to open up successfully in open foresight. This research takes a culture perspective on this issue. The leading assumption is that companies with an open culture are more likely to engage in collaboration than companies with a culture inhibiting openness. We use the Competing Values Framework to measure corporate culture, and collaboration breadth and depth to measure openness to external collaboration. Drawing on a sample of 168 Austrian companies, the research confirms that culture plays an important role in creating an environment supportive of open foresight, albeit in a somewhat surprising way: the internally oriented clan culture appears to support openness, while the externally oriented market culture does not support it. Possible explanations for this finding are put forward as directions for further research. The findings should help companies to predict whether they have the cultural conditions in place to embark on an open foresight journey successfully.

More is not always better: Effects of collaboration breadth and depth on radical and incremental innovation performance at the project level

This study investigates the effect of project-level collaboration breadth (i.e., the number of collaboration partner types) and collaboration depth (i.e., the intensity of the interactions with these partners) on the incremental and radical innovation performance of innovation projects. The econometric analyses, based on a Community Innovation Study sample of 218 innovation projects conducted in German manufacturing companies, reveal inverted U-shaped relationships between collaboration breadth and radical innovation performance and between collaboration depth and incremental innovation performance. These curvilinear effects speak to the high sensitivity of innovation projects to the extent of collaborative activity, which implies that practitioners should exert caution in managing collaborative innovation projects. This study contributes to the understanding of project-level open innovation and to the overall understanding of the performance effects of innovation collaboration, which, following recent assertions in the literature, could be flawed by analyses conducted at the organizational level.