Different Sources Of Innovation Research Articles

Understanding the relationship between competitive strategy and product-service innovation: the role of the paradox of openness

PurposeThis study aims to investigate the relationship between strategy intent (product-service innovation intention) and outcome (product-service innovation outcome), and the role that external sources of innovation play in influencing this relationship.Design/methodology/approachUsing data obtained from the community innovation survey, we apply a logit regression to a sample of 1,419 Portuguese firms. By examining the moderating effect of open innovation breadth, we assess how the relationship between differentiation intent and outcome is contingent upon the involvement of external stakeholders.FindingsOur findings reveal that the relationship between differentiation intent and outcome is contingent upon the moderating effect of open innovation breadth. Our analysis suggests that the negative influence of different sources of innovation can be addressed by adopting a paradox lens.Practical implicationsThis research provides valuable insights for managers. By simultaneously pursuing a differentiation strategy and engaging in collaboration with external sources, firms may compromise their ability to effectively differentiate their offer. Managers should consider the potential tensions arising from internal and external stakeholder relationships to optimize their innovation strategies.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the existing literature by shedding light on the role of external innovation sources in influencing the relationship between differentiation intent and outcome and the importance that information systems may have in this relationship. By exploring the moderating effect of open innovation breadth, we provide a nuanced understanding of how firms can navigate organizational tensions and leverage innovation for competitive advantage.

Market Orientation's Boundary‐Spanning Role to Support Innovation in SMEs

This study aims to examine the relationship between market orientation, sources of innovation and intra‐firm mechanisms to support innovation. A research conducted among 325 small and medium enterprises (SMEs) reveals that market orientation significantly affects sources of innovation, providing a market‐centric focus for SMEs. It also reveals that sources of innovation positively affect intra‐firm mechanisms for innovation. Finally, it reveals that market orientation has an indirect and positive effect on intrafirm mechanisms for innovation via the extent to which the studied SMEs use different sources of innovation. To better understand these relationships we consider market orientation's boundary‐spanning role for SMEs.

Beyond the Knowledge Production Function: The Role of R&D in a Multi-Faceted Innovative Process

The purpose of this paper is to test the possible catalysing role of in-house R&D in fostering the complementarity of innovative inputs on a sample of 3045 manufacturing firms drawn from the third Italian Community Innovation Survey (1998-2000). The interactions between four different sources of innovation – internal and external R&D, embodied and disembodied technological acquisitions – have been simultaneously explored through the two (direct and indirect) testing frameworks for complementarity. Results from both the approaches show that the innovative process is a phenomenon combining within itself both complementarity and substitutability relationships, depending both on the typology of the targeted innovation output and on the particular combination of innovative inputs we focus on. In particular, it is in-house R&D that seems to create the precondition allowing firms to enjoy complementarity effects. Indeed, the possibility of exploiting synergies between different innovative inputs turns out to be subordinated to having undertaken a minimum amount of internal R&D.

The Catalysing Role of In-House R&D in Fostering the Complementarity of Innovative Inputs

The aim of this study is to test the possible catalysing role of in-house R&D in fostering the complementarity of innovative inputs on a sample of 3045 manufacturing firms drawn from the third Italian Community Innovation Survey (1998-2000). The interactions between four different sources of innovation – internal and external R&D, embodied and disembodied technological acquisitions – have been simultaneously explored through the two (direct and indirect) testing frameworks for complementarity. Results from both the approaches show that the innovative process is a phenomenon combining within itself both complementarity and substitutability relationships, depending both on the typology of the targeted innovation output and on the particular combination of innovative inputs we focus on. In particular, it is in-house R&D that seems to create the precondition allowing firms to enjoy complementarity effects. Indeed, the possibility of exploiting synergies between different innovative inputs turns out to be subordinated to having undertaken a minimum amount of internal R&D. The implication of this result is that a role for in-house R&D emerges, beyond its direct effect in generating an innovative output: even if internal research is not a necessary precondition for a firm to be innovative, it should still be carried out because of its important role in the generation of synergies that amplify the impacts of the other innovative inputs it interacts with.

Sources of Innovation in the Estonian Forest and Wood Cluster

The paper aims to identify the role of different sources of innovation for the Estonian wood sector. Comparing data from survey of Innovation in Estonian Enterprises 1998 2000 with similar Finnish data reveals that linkages in Estonian forest and wood cluster are relatively weaker regarding innovation sources. Universities and research institutes are the weakest part identified in the knowledge flows of the emerging Estonian wood cluster. Technological capabilities of Estonian wood and forest industries have passed the absorption phase and entered the adoption phase, but still the absorptive capacities remain relatively low, as indicated by the high importance of internal innovation sources and the low intensity of using R&D institutions and universities as innovation sources. We applied binary logit model in order to identify the role of different sources of innovation for the Estonian wood sector. Suppliers are the most significant partner for innovation cooperation and also the second innovation source after internal sources. Customers are more used for innovative products and by those companies that lack knowledge about markets. The internal information of concerns is not diffused to other firms. The future development of the Estonian forest and wood cluster should be oriented towards the development of high end production capacities in the value network. This requires joint efforts of the government and industries, as well as collaboration oriented behaviour of Estonian companies.

New knowledge: production v. diffusion; the case of UK biotechnology

This paper looks at issues of appropriability and diffusion in UK biotechnology. It contrasts the various solutions to appropriability problems facing the production of R&D with the more intractable problems of diffusion, in particular across the university-industry divide. It focuses on issues of ownership of new knowledge between university and industry and argues that these, in practice, are relatively straightforward to solve. Issues of diffusion, on the other hand, depend on ease of movement between university and industrial careers, choice of project that scientists work on, ease of collaboration between universities and industry and the existence of networks of contacts between the two environments. With regard to such issues it is harder in the UK than in the USA for scientists to move between the two environments, to combine dual careers in academia and industry, for academic scientists to find industrial collaborators and for fluid networks to exist between the two environments. It is argued, however, that these difficulties in diffusion vary between different industrial sectors in their relations with the science base; certain sectors such as pharmaceuticals, diagnostics or instrumentation, are more receptive to ideas originating in the science base than are sectors such as food, or energy or to some extent chemicals. This may be due to different sources of innovation for the different sectors of biotechnology. If innovation originates in research as in pharmaceuticals or diagnostics, or with science base users, as with scientific instruments, companies are more receptive to links with the science base. If, on the other hand, more downstream processes or marketing innovations are more important, as in chemicals, food or energy, the large companies which dominate these sectors are less responsive to new knowledge occurring outside their own industrial sector and in the science base.