External Knowledge Search Research Articles

Evaluating the determinative factors driving patents and foreign technologies acquisitions in Visegrád countries

PurposeThis paper aims to empirically examine the factors driving the acquisition of patents and foreign technologies in 2,198 firms spanning multiple industries in Visegrád countries.Design/methodology/approachTo fulfil the research objectives, the authors used the binary logistic regression models for the empirical specifications to analyse the various hypotheses to ascertain the factors contributing to patents, foreign technologies and international quality certificate acquisitions in Visegrád countries.FindingsThe results show that technological innovations, in-house and external research and development, intense competition from the informal sector and external knowledge search positively influence firms to acquire patents, foreign technologies and international quality certificates. The study further showed that certain firm characteristics, such as size, having a board of directors, female top managers and top managers’ experience, positively influenced firms’ ability to obtain patents, foreign technologies and international quality certificates.Originality/valueThe authors provide new insights into understanding the factors contributing to international technological linkages in the context of transitional countries such as the Visegrád four group. The authors have shown that international technology linkages through foreign technology licences and international quality certifications are vital for innovations in transition economies.

Green entrepreneurial orientation, boundary-spanning search and enterprise sustainable performance: The moderating role of environmental dynamism.

As an important strategic decision for enterprise sustainability, the green entrepreneurial orientation can facilitate boundary-spanning search for external knowledge and resources to achieve triadic sustainable economic, environmental, and social performance. Based on organizational search theory and dynamic capability theory, this study introduces environmental dynamism into the model of the relationship between green entrepreneurial orientation, boundary-spanning search and enterprise triadic sustainable performance. By analyzing the questionnaire data from 202 managers of manufacturing SMEs, the study explores the internal and external influences of green entrepreneurial orientation on the enterprise sustainable performance. The results show that: green entrepreneurial orientation has a positive impact on enterprise economic, environmental and social performance; boundary-spanning search plays a fully mediating role between green entrepreneurial orientation and enterprise economic, environmental and social performance; environmental dynamism, as a key external environmental factor, positively regulates the relationship between boundary-spanning search and enterprise economic performance and environmental performance, and negatively regulates the relationship between boundary-spanning search and social performance. This study clearly demonstrates how green entrepreneurial orientation in the environmental era can drive triadic sustainable performance improvement of enterprises. In addition, this study argues that boundary-spanning search is an important tool that enables manufacturing SMEs to achieve a triad of coordinated sustainable development of economic, environmental and social benefits in a dynamic environment.

Interplay of External and Internal Knowledge: Business Model Innovation Analysis in Chinese Publicly Traded Film Companies

The application of business model innovation (BMI) generally creates more competent and flexible enterprises in changeable markets and helps to achieve competitive advantages. Especially in a post-pandemic age, BMI has a particular significance. As such, in this study, based on the resource-based view theory, we aimed to explore how Chinese publicly traded film companies apply BMI from the perspective of the interplay of external and internal knowledge acquisition. Our focus was examining the influence of the search for external knowledge and the creation of internal knowledge on the BMI of Chinese film companies. On the basis of interviews and field observation, we selected environmental volatility and management attention as the independent variables in the study model. We analyzed the data collected from 36 Chinese publicly traded film companies by correlation and regression. The results showed that external knowledge search and internal knowledge creation substantially influenced the BMI of Chinese film companies. In addition, environmental volatility and management attention positively influenced BMI. The findings provide practical information motivating Chinese publicly traded film companies to apply BMI in the post-pandemic era.

An adoption-implementation framework of digital green knowledge to improve the performance of digital green innovation practices for industry 5.0

Despite the current slowdown in global economic growth due to the impact of COVID-19, the digital economy is still performing well. Under the background of double carbon, green innovation and intelligent production of manufacturing enterprises have become the general trend of sustainable development. It is particularly important to study the integration of digital technology into green innovation and production processes to improve the performance of digital green innovation and the competitiveness of enterprises. However, the integration of digital technology and green innovation from the perspective of knowledge management has not been fully introduced into current literatures. In this study, hierarchical regression and fsQCA approaches were used to empirically verify the adoption process of digital green innovation activities and the impact of digital green knowledge creation on digital green innovation performance (DGIP), and explores the moderating effects of digital green risk perception (DGRP) and digital green complexity perception (DGCC) through 429 questionnaires from Chinese manufacturing enterprises. In addition, knowledge search is divided into three dimensions: scientific digital green knowledge search (SDGKS), market digital green knowledge search (MDGKS) and supply chain digital green knowledge search (SCDGKS). The results show that: i) SDGKS promotes exploitative digital green knowledge creation (EDGKC). MDGKS has a positive impact on both utilizing digital green knowledge creation (ADGKC) and EDGKC. SCDGKS promotes EDGKC. ii) The relationship between SDGKS and EDGKC is only moderated by DGCC (positive). The relationship between MDGKS and EDGKC is only moderated by DGCC (negative). The relationship between SCDGKS and EDGKC is moderated by DGRP (negative) and DGCC (negative). iii) There is an inverted U-shaped relationship between ADGKC and DGIP. There is a U-shaped relationship between EDGKC and DGIP. The essence of this study is to help manufacturing enterprises find external partners to improve their digital green innovation performance through external knowledge search partner selection. The conclusion of this study has certain theoretical contribution to the clarification of the complex process of digital green innovation. This study provides a theoretical basis for enterprises to select knowledge search partners according to their own environment to carry out digital green innovation activities smoothly. This study has practical value for enterprises to improve competitiveness, better survival and development process under the current environment.

Big Data Utilization in Innovation: Innovation Enhancing Activity or Capability-Enhancing Activity?

The potential benefit of big data utilization through the generation of data-driven knowledge raises questions about its role in firms’ innovation performance. This paper explores two roles of big data utilization on firms’ innovation: ‘innovation-enhancing activity’ and ‘capability-enhancing activity’. While the first role highlights big data utilization as one enabler of the data-driven innovation process, the latter emphasizes the role of big data utilization to complement firms’ external knowledge search activity to enable greater innovation performance. Using the matched data of the UK E-Commerce and ICT Survey 2015 and the UK Innovation Survey 2017 for over 1,300 firms in the UK, we use both probit and OLS regression models to investigate how big data utilization both directly and indirectly influence firms’ innovation performance, measured by innovation outcomes and innovation productivity. While we find no evidence for big data utilization as innovation-enhancing activity, our results support big data utilization as capability-enhancing activity. Our results indicate the indirect effect of big data utilization on firms’ innovation performance and emphasize the role of big data utilization to complement firms’ search behaviour by enhancing firms’ absorptive capacity and collaboration capability. Our results highlight both the capability-enhancing role of big data utilization and the importance of adopting a strategic approach to maximize the innovation benefits of big data utilization and external knowledge search activity.

Sources of Innovation Revisited: Patterns in Firms’ Usage of Internal and External Search

Recent open innovation literature has emphasized external knowledge search and the use of a diverse set of external innovation sources. But firms also have a diverse set of internal innovation sources, and we show that there are distinct patterns across external and internal sources that reflect differences in how firms create and capture value. Our analysis of the innovative activities of 256 large firms from seven countries and across seven industry sectors reveals two distinct innovation search strategies: “tech-focus,” which emphasizes exploration and is associated with more innovative outcomes, and “market-focus,” which emphasizes exploitation and is associated with higher market value. Finally, we show that characterizing innovation sourcing as tech-vs.-market better explains differences in firm performance than traditional measures such as openness.

Enhancing external knowledge search: The influence of performance measurement system design on the absorptive capacity of top management teams

External knowledge search is critical for innovation performance and centers on a firm's absorptive capacity. This study investigates whether and how two dimensions of absorptive capacity at the top management team (TMT) level, potential absorptive capacity and realized absorptive capacity, are influenced by two design choices of the performance measurement system (PMS), broad scope PMS and PMS integration, under different conditions of environmental dynamism. Based on cross-sectional survey data from firms in innovative industries, the results of our empirical study indicate that in more dynamic environments, a broader scope PMS is associated with higher potential absorptive capacity whereas higher PMS integration is associated with lower potential absorptive capacity. These associations are not observable in more stable environments. Moreover, broad scope PMS and PMS integration are both positively associated with realized absorptive capacity, independently of environmental dynamism. These findings highlight the relevance of PMS design choices for absorptive capacity, showing on the one hand the differences between the implications of broad scope PMS and those of PMS integration and, on the other hand, that the implications of PMS design choices for potential absorptive capacity (i.e. acquisition and assimilation of external knowledge) follow different patterns than the implications for realized absorptive capacity (i.e. the transformation and exploitation of such knowledge).

The Influence of External Knowledge Searches on Enterprises’ Innovation Performance: A Meta-Analysis

Innovation is one aspect of the pursuit of the harmonious development of the environment, economy, and society. Although prior research has examined the factors that influence corporate innovation, how external knowledge search affects it remains unclear. We contribute to this literature by examining how knowledge searches influence firms’ innovation performance from a knowledge-based point of view and organizational search theory. We utilized meta-analysis to conduct empirical testing on 15,059 samples from 58 independent studies. The conclusions are as follows: first, the overall test showed a significant positive correlation between external knowledge search and firm innovation performance; second, the group test shows that the positive impact of external knowledge search on the innovation performance of mature enterprises is more obvious; scaled measurement and collectivism have more significant influences on the relationship between external knowledge search and firm innovation performance. Further research concluded that a breadth search could provide higher innovation performance than a depth search. Meanwhile, the same results were obtained in the subgroup tests of start-ups, non-high-tech enterprises, high-tech enterprises, scale measurement, and collectivism. Finally, both balanced knowledge search and joint knowledge searches significantly improved the innovation performance of enterprises, and the innovation effect brought by balanced knowledge search is more prominent than the latter.

Social Media Usage, External Knowledge Search Breadth, and Product Innovation: A Case of Manufacturing Firms in Thailand

Social Media Usage, External Knowledge Search Breadth, and Product Innovation: A Case of Manufacturing Firms in Thailand

Barriers to external knowledge search for innovation: empirical evidence from the Korean manufacturing industry

PurposeThis study focuses on resolving empirical inconsistencies in the relationship between external search breadth and innovation performance. Based on research on the knowledge-based view and innovation barriers, three internal barriers that weaken the effectiveness of external search breadth are discerned: information, rigidity and financial barriers.Design/methodology/approachFor empirical analysis, the Korean Innovation Survey 2016 of manufacturing firms was utilized. This study defines innovation performance as the number of patent applications and new product introduction that are analyzed through zero-inflated negative binomial and logistic regressions, respectively.FindingsThe empirical analysis showed three findings. First, external search breadth has a positive relationship with the number of patent applications but not with new product introduction. Second, financial barrier weakens the positive association of external search breadth with the number of patent applications. Third, the interactions of external search breadth with the three internal barriers are negatively related to new product introduction.Originality/valueThis study makes two theoretical contributions. First, by examining barriers to external knowledge search, this research helps identify potential bottlenecks in this search. Second, the study reveals that the effectiveness of external search breadth may have a boundary in firm innovation by showing that this search affects patent application and new product introduction differently.

Dynamic openness for network-enabled product and process innovation: a panel-data analysis

PurposePrior research on open innovation has not investigated changes in knowledge acquisition strategies of firms over time overlooking how learning from past knowledge acquisition can change subsequent search strategies. Also, prior research has focused principally on product innovation overlooking process innovation. The purpose of the paper is to introduce the concept of dynamic openness, which is defined as temporal changes in external knowledge search strategy. We explore four dynamic openness strategies – closing down, opening up, persistent open and persistent closed – and examine the impact of these strategies on both product and process innovation.Design/methodology/approachThe authors used a panel dataset of 16,021 firms based on five waves (2009–2017) of the UK Community Innovation Survey (UKIS). All models are estimated using firm and year fixed effects (FE) method to control for endogeneity that arises from unobserved heterogeneity. Endogeneity and robustness tests were carried out to ensure the validity of results.FindingsThe results show that firms do use dynamic openness strategies over time leveraging learning from past searches. Specifically, the study indicates that closing down is not an effective strategy for either type of innovation. For process innovation, firms should pursue opening up strategy rather than persistent open strategy, whereas for product innovation firms could pursue either strategy, highlighting important contextual differences.Originality/valueThe paper contributes to the literature on knowledge acquisition in open innovation: (1) by theorizing the underlying reasons – learning from past collaborations, absorptive capacity and external knowledge heterogeneity – why firms pursue one dynamic openness strategy over another and (2) by extending literature by delineating the dynamic openness strategies that firms should pursue in process innovation vs product innovation.

Linking External Knowledge Search to Innovation Ambidexterity in SMEs

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of external knowledge search strategy on innovation ambidexterity for SMEs. In order to achieve the purpose of research, hypotheses were set up by dividing exploitative knowledge sources and exploitative knowledge. Based on the Tobit regression analysis results by using the 975 data of Science and Technology Policy Institute, this research provides four findings as follows: First, exploitative knowledge breadth positively and significantly influences innovation ambidexterity. Second, exploitative knowledge depth positively and significantly influences innovation ambidexterity. Third, explorative knowledge breadth positively and significantly influences innovation ambidexterity. Lastly, the relationship between explorative knowledge significantly influences innovation ambidexterity. The results indicate that their knowledge search strategies ware significant driver of their innovation ambidexterity. In the final conclusion section implications and limitations of research results and suggestion for future research are discussed.

Exploring the asymmetric complementarity between external knowledge search and management innovation

This paper hypothesizes about and tests the conditions under which firms experience substitutional and complementary effects from the synchronous deployment of innovation search—in the form of external knowledge sourcing, and management innovation—in the form of new organizational processes, practices, and structures, on innovative performance. Theoretically, this represents an interesting puzzle as the extant literature offers two contradictory explanations regarding their synchronous effects, built on fundamentally different problem-solving mechanisms that expose distinct managerial challenges for coordinating external search activities. Specifically, we predict the existence of a substitutional effect between external search depth and management innovation, and a complementary effect between external search breadth and management innovation. We found strong evidence relevant to our theoretical predictions. Our study offers new theoretical insights regarding the synchronicity of innovation search and management innovation.

Internal knowledge networks and employees' performance in a collaborative context: an empirical study of Japanese universities

The effect of cohesive networks on employees' performance has led to a protracted dispute among researchers. This study investigated the relationships between the internal knowledge network and employees' performance in a collaborative context. Using questionnaire survey data, we examined the ego networks of 274 research managers and administrators from Japanese universities and research organisations. The results of logistic regression analysis showed that a cohesive network structure has a significant positive relationship with the perceived performance of individuals and the workplace. External knowledge search activity of networks also had a positive relationship with individual and workplace performance. Our findings clarify the positive relationship of a cohesive internal network with employees' performance in a collaborative context where multiple, specialised tasks have to be cooperatively performed. Our results can be of benefit in extending the practice of university research management.

Knowledge search, knowledge integration and enterprise breakthrough innovation under the characteristics of innovation ecosystem network: The empirical evidence from enterprises in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region.

Enterprises acquire heterogeneous knowledge through external knowledge search and adapt to the change of external environment, which is of great significance to enterprise breakthrough innovation. This paper takes the innovation ecosystem as the boundary of the research paradigm. Based on innovation ecosystem theory, knowledge management theory and enterprise innovation theory, this paper constructs a moderated mediation model of the enterprise knowledge search, knowledge integration and breakthrough innovation under the characteristics of innovation ecosystem network. This model is tested on the survey data of 344 technology enterprise and manufacturing industries including R&D departments in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. The research results show that: knowledge integration plays part of the intermediary role between knowledge search and enterprise breakthrough innovation; the larger the network scale, the stronger the network connection, the stronger the intermediary role of knowledge integration on the relationship between knowledge search and enterprise breakthrough innovation. The research results reveal the important role of the innovation ecosystem in enterprise breakthrough innovation. At the same time, the research on knowledge search and enterprise breakthrough innovation should consider the network characteristics of innovation ecosystem and the ability of enterprise knowledge integration.

The Impact of Specialized Knowledge Search on Enterprise Innovation

Against the backdrop of the fierce competition in the market nowadays, a closed innovation model based on internal knowledge is no longer sufficient to support enterprises in search of high-performance innovation. Instead, corporations are desperately required to search for resources of external knowledge to meet their innovation goals. Existing studies on open innovation in corporate management failed to fully elaborate on the mechanism of how the external knowledge search could impose an impact on sustaining innovation and disruptive innovation. In this study, the external knowledge search was divided into three categories according to the knowledge-based theory, namely, the scientific knowledge search, the market knowledge search, and the supply-chain knowledge search. While taking into account the moderating role of the focus of attention of the manager, we analyzed the statistical results of 485 questionnaires collected from manufacturing enterprises to elaborate on the mechanism of how the specialized knowledge search could impose an impact on sustaining innovation and disruptive innovation. Our research conclusions are expected to enrich existing studies on the factors contributing to corporate innovation, including but not limited to sustaining innovation and disruptive innovation. In addition, the research findings are expected to lay an empirical foundation by summarizing previous theoretical opinions while providing references for subsequent in-depth studies in the meantime. Moreover, the paper has put forward practical management measures and suggestions that could enable enterprises in developing countries to search and effectively transform the external knowledge into innovative outcomes. Last but not least, this study is expected to provide both theoretical and practical guidance for enterprises to further facilitate innovation by means of knowledge search.

How corporate venture capital investors search external knowledge to bridge internal knowledge gaps

Real options theory implies a difficult trade-off for CVC investors engaging in external knowledge search to diversify their own knowledge: CVC investors with low internal knowledge diversity would benefit greatly from access to diverse external knowledge, but limited experience with different knowledge areas makes diverse CVC portfolios infeasible. To resolve this trade-off between minimizing redundancies and maximizing synergies in a CVC portfolio, we extend real options reasoning with organizational learning theory and examine how a CVC investor’s knowledge diversity shapes its CVC portfolio diversity. Based on both theories, we identify positive and negative portfolio effects that change investors’ motivation to diversify. These effects provide theoretical argumentation that the investor’s internal knowledge diversity is related to the diversity of its CVC portfolio in an inverted U-shaped relationship. Using a sample of 968 firm-year observations between 2000 and 2018, we find support for our hypothesis. We further show how this relationship is bounded by conditions of high R&D intensity, high exploration focus as well as high technological uncertainty. The moderating effects of all three boundary conditions are strong enough to flatten the relationship between internal knowledge diversity and CVC portfolio diversity to a straight line.

Matching external search strategies with radical and incremental innovation and the role of knowledge integration capability

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to analyze the differential effects of two external search strategies on radical innovation (RI) and incremental innovation (II) and explore the mediating role of knowledge integration capability (KIC).Design/methodology/approachThe paper is based on the data collected from a sample of 241 firms from Chinese electronic information industry. The author conducted a hierarchical regression analysis using SPSS and PROCESS to test the proposed hypotheses.FindingsThe results showed that both external search breadth and depth have positive effects on RI/II performance. The author also found that the effect of search breadth on RI is greater than that on II, and the effect of search depth on RI is less than that on II. Moreover, the author discovered that KIC fully or partially mediates the relationship between external search strategies and RI/II.Originality/valueThe paper provides a finer grained understanding concerning the difference in the impacts of the two external search strategies on RI/II performance. The paper also adds to the existing literature by explaining the path in which external knowledge search influences RI/II through the mediation effect of KIC.

External knowledge search, opportunity recognition and industry 4.0 adoption in SMEs

Technologies related to Industry 4.0 require Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to understand their potential applications before they are adopted. In this paper, we test empirically a framework that links SME search strategies within their ecosystem (i.e., breadth of search vs. depth of search) to the capability of SMEs to recognise digital opportunities associated with Industry 4.0 (i.e., digital design, digital manufacturing and digital servitisation opportunities). We analyse a sample of 174 manufacturing SMEs operating in Italy. Our results illustrate the distinguishing traits of the knowledge search paths required to implement Industry 4.0 technologies in an SME manufacturing setting. In particular, they indicate that the recognition of digital opportunities in both product design and manufacturing processes require a depth of collaboration in the innovation process to capture firm and industry-specific company needs and to create mutual trust among the parties. Conversely, digital opportunities in the realm of product/service platforms require a breadth of search for SMEs to invest in different information technology layers to support the digitalisation of a product. We also find that all three groups of digital opportunities positively influence the extent of adoption of information and digital technologies (e.g., IoT, big data analytics, simulation). Our findings bring finer-grained evidence on how digital opportunities are linked with the adoption of the different types of Industry 4.0 technologies, reflecting the peculiar traits of manufacturing SMEs. Moreover, they show managers how to set specific collaboration strategies with the ecosystem according to the digital opportunities they are willing to pursue.

How does open innovation contribute to the firm's dynamic capabilities?

A pressing management issue exists to understand how firms can develop dynamic capabilities (DC) through processes such as open innovation (OI). Our study aims to expand knowledge in this area by explicating the underlying mechanisms of OI that contribute to a firm's DC. Adopting a microfoundations perspective, we examined three separate new product development projects in a UK manufacturer over a period of two years. Our findings demonstrate that manufacturing firms can exploit technological and market-based knowledge resources during OI activities and we have developed a process model to reflect these findings. We were able to identify three underlying mechanisms of OI: realization, engagement, and appropriation, that contribute to the creation of firm resources and the firm's DC. Our study reveals that each mechanism links the process of OI to a firm's DC by sequentially and reciprocally altering the firm's abilities for sensing and seizing opportunities. This improved understanding of the microfoundations of OI enables us to explain how external knowledge search and the ensuing knowledge appropriation can correct misalignment between a firm's current capabilities and its future market opportunities, and, thus, enhance the firm's DC.