Innovation Activities Of Firms Research Articles

Innovation obstacles in an emerging high tech sector

ObjetivoO objetivo deste artigo é estudar os fatores que atuam como obstáculos à inovação em tecnologias emergentes, tomando o caso da agricultura de precisão na Argentina.Design/metodologia/abordagemO caso da agricultura de precisão na Argentina é estudado combinando técnicas econométricas e análises qualitativas. Com base numa pesquisa com 67 empresas que desenvolvem tecnologias de agricultura de precisão na Argentina, examinamos o impacto de diferentes tipos de obstáculos nas atividades de crescimento e inovação das empresas. Esta análise é complementada com as conclusões que emergem de uma série de entrevistas com diferentes partes interessadas (gestores das empresas, responsáveis políticos, especialistas, agricultores, etc.).ResultadosDescobrimos que os fatores de mercado e custo afetam negativamente o crescimento das empresas, enquanto os obstáculos institucionais reduzem a quantidade de esforços de inovação. Além do mais, as barreiras do conhecimento impactam positivamente na relevância que as empresas atribuem às atividades de P & D. Também identificamos diferentes estratégias que as empresas implementaram para superar as barreiras que enfrentam. Finalmente, discutimos as implicações políticas de nossos resultados.Originalidade/valorAs tecnologias de AP contribuem para a agricultura sustentável e oferecem uma oportunidade para o surgimento de fornecedores locais de equipamentos e serviços, baseados na ciência de dados, inteligência artificial e na Internet das Coisas. Para os autores, este é o primeiro estudo que explora os obstáculos ao crescimento e inovação nas firmas de PA. As contribuições deste estudo são relevantes tanto para pesquisas futuras quanto para formuladores de políticas interessados em promover o surgimento de clusters de alta tecnologia em países em desenvolvimento.Palabras claveObstáculos à inovação, Política de inovação, Agricultura de precisão

Improving access to finance for young innovative enterprises with growth potential: Evidence of impact of R&D grant schemes on firms' outputs

AbstractResponding to the lack of in-depth research into the effects of R&D grants for scale-ups, this article examines how they impact upon firms' employment, firm economic and innovative performance, and firm innovative activities. Drawing on both policy evaluations and empirical literature relating to R&D programmes and firms' outputs, it contributes by discussing and comparing different types of R&D programmes and analyzing the wider policy implications. Overall, positive outcomes are found on employment, total sales and share of innovative sales (effects which can persist for several years), and companies' innovation capacities. Moreover, the effects for R&D grants for scale-ups are larger than the effects of both generic R&D grants and R&D subsidies. In terms of policy implications, R&D grants stimulate and prepare companies for growth and targeted funding (technology focused) delivers better results for disruptive innovations, whereas generic grants for small and medium-sized enterprises are better suited for knowledge diffusion. Despite the positive effects of milestone-based selection mechanisms and phased funding, they are still under-used. Competitive R&D grants help companies to attract follow up (especially equity) funding. When coupled with complementary services (e.g. networking, advice), there is a longer lasting effect. Lastly, tax incentives and grants are complementary as regards to their impact on firm growth and innovation activities.

Green patents: a way to guide the eco-innovation success process?

PropósitoExplorar los determinantes del éxito de los procesos de ecoinnovación, utilizando la intensidad de I + D y las patentes verdes como indicadores para la medición y el análisis de la ecoinnovación.Diseño/metodología/enfoqueSe analizan y presentan los resultados de una investigación cuantitativa basada en una muestra de 2218 empresas con perfiles proactivos en ecoinnovación, de las cuales 249 tienen patentes verdes registradas en España o en la Unión Europea.ResultadosLos resultados sugieren relaciones positivas entre la actividad de ecoinnovación de las empresas con su actividad de innovación y la intensidad de la I + D. Los resultados también confirman los efectos que la implementación de innovaciones tiene sobre el desempeño financiero de las empresas.Limitaciones/implicaciones de la investigación (si corresponde)La medición de la ecoinnovación es incluso más compleja que la medición de la innovación debido a sus aspectos ambientales intrínsecos. Se podría alcanzar una evaluación más profunda con un mayor número de variables y una muestra más grande.Implicaciones prácticas (si corresponde)Los resultados serán útiles para futuros estudios sobre el tema y para los profesionales que toman decisiones sobre inversiones en investigación y desarrollo en colaboración y su protección a través de la propiedad industrial en forma de patentes verdes. Los principales determinantes de la ecoinnovación analizados en este estudio pueden traducirse directamente a las prácticas, ya que proporcionan información sobre cómo fortalecer estos determinantes en las inversiones en I + D ambiental y el registro de patentes verdes.Originalidad/valorA pesar de la popularidad y el impacto potencial de la ecoinnovación en la economía o la sociedad, se ha quedado corto en cuanto a su potencial para mejorar el desempeño financiero de las empresas. Este estudio sostiene que el nivel de actividad de ecoinnovación explica cierta variabilidad en el desempeño financiero. De hecho, aquellas empresas que tienen mayores niveles de innovación aumentan su desempeño.

Beyond the lean start-up: experimentation in corporate entrepreneurship and innovation

ABSTRACTIn this essay, we argue that entrepreneurship and innovation researchers should pay more attention to experimentation as an approach to innovation and corporate entrepreneurship in established firms. While there is a growing body of research examining experimentation in start-ups, there is no corresponding literature investigating the role of experiments in the innovation and corporate entrepreneurship activities of established firms despite the increasing interest in experimentation among managers and the growing practitioner literature urging established firms to adopt experimentation. We discuss this trend and point to a number of research areas that we believe deserve systematic research.

External linkages and intellectual assets as indicators of firms? innovation activities: results from the Czech Republic and Poland

Research background: Firms? innovation activities play an important role in fostering firms? competitiveness and enhancing economic growth of regions and countries. Regarding the significance of the issue, it is essential to explore indicators of firms? innovation activities. Here, special attention was given to external linkages and intellectual assets. In the study, particular emphasis was put on firms from the Czech Republic and Poland as the countries distinguished by similar innovation performance.
 Purpose of the article: The aim of this paper is to explore whether external link-ages and intellectual assets impact on innovation activities of Czech and Polish firms.
 Methods: In the study, the Cobb-Douglas function was employed. The study used data from the European Innovation Scoreboard 2018 with regard to firms? innovation activities. In particular, special stress was put on variables related to external linkages and intellectual assets such as: innovative SMEs collaborating with others, private co-funding of public R&D expenditures, PCT patent applications and trademark applications. The time period was 2008?2015.
 Findings & Value added: This paper contributes to the existing literature by providing new insight on issues connected with indicators of firms? innovation activities. The results reveal statistical significance of selected variables connected with external linkages and intellectual assets on innovation activities of Czech and Polish firms. These findings have policy and practical implications. There is a need to further stimulate, among others, the linkages between firms and universities, research organisations, institutional environment.

기업의 기술혁신활동에 관한 슘페터 가설 검정 : 국내 게임산업을 대상으로

기업의 기술혁신활동에 관한 슘페터 가설 검정 : 국내 게임산업을 대상으로

Forsaking innovation: addressing failure and innovation behaviour variety

ABSTRACT This paper analyses how innovation active firms respond when innovation projects fail or are abandoned. We regard innovation as a process where firms engage in a variety of behaviours combining internal and external characteristics including their propensity to cooperate, to compete, to engage in research and development activities as well as on the composition of their knowledge base. We compare how their aggregate innovation behaviour responds when failure is experienced. Using data from the UK innovation survey, our results first highlight that failure has an effect only on specific innovation strategies, and second, when failure occurs, it can either reinforce existing behaviours or reverse them.

The innovation spillovers from outward and inward foreign direct investment: a firm-level spatial analysis

ABSTRACTThis paper estimates and compares the spatial spillovers from both inward and outward foreign direct investment (FDI) to the innovation activities of indigenous firms, in particular, the innovation input and output. This analytical study is based on a firm-level spatial dynamic regression, which is, for the first time, conducted on a large-scale firm-level panel in the FDI literature. Using data from Shandong province in China over the period 2002–07, we find that both inward FDI (IFDI) and outward FDI (OFDI) significantly stimulate innovation activities of domestic firms. More importantly, the spillover effect from OFDI is much larger than that from IFDI. The results tend to support the going-out strategy of the Chinese government.

Factors influencing innovation in maritime clusters: An empirical study from Australia

The extant literature on innovation in maritime clusters is predominantly concerned with understanding the innovative activities of maritime firms in terms of outputs and how they are influenced by cluster and extra-cluster environments. As such they overlook the firm-level practices also contributing to innovation in these maritime clusters. Substantial empirical evidence reveals that irrespective of location, firms' innovative outputs are also influenced by their internal organisational practices. The purpose of this paper is to provide a more complete picture of the factors influencing innovation in maritime clusters. The analysis is based on survey data from 54 maritime firms located in two Australian maritime clusters using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). The results suggest that the innovation activities of firms located in maritime clusters are indeed not only influenced by cluster-specific and extra-cluster specific factors but also by firm-specific factors. These firm-specific factors relate to harnessing the competence base, structures and systems and culture and climate for innovation.

Technology directors and firm innovation

This study examines the influence of board directors with technological expertise on innovation using a panel of listed manufacturing firms in China from 2008 to 2017. The results show that technology directors positively affect firm innovation activities measured by R&D expenditure to sales ratio, invention patents applied for and granted, and utility model/design patents applied for and granted. The effect of technology directors on patents applied for and granted is weaker in firms with financial constraints and firms with CEO-chairman duality. Furthermore, independent technology directors show a stronger effect on invention patents granted than executive technology directors do.

When drivers of clusters shift scale from local towards global: What remains for regional innovation policy?

Industries and regional economies evolve as a result of the interplay between local and non-local factors. Increasing globalization of both production- and innovation activities implies a shift in the relevant scales of interaction from the local towards the global level. This paper is concerned with the implications of such scale shifts for the role of the region and for cluster-related regional policies. It examines what is left of the role of regional settings in fostering economic development when extra-regional drivers of change increase in importance. We investigate this crucial question with two in-depth case studies of the medical technologies sector, in which such scale shifts have been particularly pronounced.Our findings from empirical material collected in Scania/Sweden and Vienna/Austria illustrate the ways in which changes in national and supra-national regulatory frameworks have had a profound impact on the innovation activities of individual firms and the way to develop and launch new products, and subsequently on the regions in which they cluster. Such scale-shifts have, on the one hand, limited the potential for regional policy to shape the cluster’s path through support for supply-side factors. Yet some critical assets remain local but are increasingly difficult to access. By addressing such barriers to access, regional policy can still strongly affect the opportunities for innovation. Furthermore, in an increasingly open industry system, we see an expanded role for regional policy in supporting firms to access critical assets and sources of innovation found external to the region.

Transformation of firm innovation activities into brand effect

PurposeBrand effect is an important source of innovation performance, but rarely any study in the past has paid attention to explore the way firm innovation activities transform into brand effect. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how firm innovation activities transform into brand effect.Design/methodology/approachA set of hypothesis has been developed to show the relationships among firm innovation activities, brand prototype, brand preference and brand recommendation. The online survey method was used for data collection. In total, 546 valid questionnaires were retrieved. The study used confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling technique to test the hypothesis.FindingsResults indicate that brand prototype leads the process of cognitive processing from innovation activities’ perception to brand preference and recommendation. The consumer perception of process innovation, marketing innovation, product innovation and the store environment have direct impact on brand prototype that further influences product sophistication, brand preference and brand recommendation. But, the most powerful influence is on brand preference. Moreover, product sophistication–attribute-specific brand knowledge has direct impact on brand preference and indirect impact on the brand recommendation. The whole process from brand prototype to brand preference and brand recommendation mainly reflects the strength of the brand effect formation.Practical implicationsThis study provides useful managerial insights so that firms can learn the way to maximize brand effect through the management of innovation perception and cultivation of innovation soft capability to enhance innovation performance.Originality/valueThis study unfolds the transformation of firm innovation activities into brand effect that provides a new theoretical explanation and a holistic framework for the source of innovation performance.

ICT-based innovation and its competitive outcome: the role of information intensity

PurposePrior research highlights the vital role of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) for innovation in response to environmental conditions. However, there is a lack of studies that analyse the determinants of ICT investments on the innovation activities of firms in relation with their impacts on the industrial and competitive dynamics using large data sets. The paper aims to discuss these issues.Design/methodology/approachIn this paper, the authors investigate the effects of ICT investments on the industrial and competitive dynamics for a large and representative panel data set. All the industries are included, and lagged effects of ICT investments are studied. The model is tested on a seven-year panel (2008–2014) of 231 Italian industries using two-stage least squares instrumental-variables estimators with industry time and fixed effects.FindingsThe results indicate that munificent industries and higher ICT spending are interrelated facts, showing that in sectors with more growth opportunities firms invest more in ICT and this leads to higher industry concentration, greater profit dispersion and higher competitive turbulence in the sector. Also, the paper shows that SMEs can rarely take advantage of their ICT-based innovation to start high-growth phenomena.Practical implicationsThe results suggest that ICT-based innovation may create competitive advantages that are hard to sustain over the long-term raising important implications for managers involved in ICT-enabled innovations and policy-makers involved in building programs to foster innovation.Originality/valueAgainst the backdrop of today’s digital transformation, the paper enriches our understanding on the disruptive effects exerted by the digitalization of the innovation process and provides a base to continue the investigation of industrial changes and competitive dynamics.

Local variety and innovation performance in the EU textile and clothing industry

ABSTRACTA large body of the literature showed that related variety at local level is more relevant than unrelated variety for explaining the innovation performance of firms. Knowledge relatedness is usually measured by considering activities within the same industry (i.e. the same two-digit code) while activities in different industries are associated with unrelated variety. This approach is challenged by the increasing relevance of transversal technologies, i.e. technologies that are developed and applied in rather different sectors. As a result, between industry variety (i.e. unrelated variety) is expected to be more important than within industry variety (i.e. related variety). We test this hypothesis by examining the innovation activities of firms in the textile and clothing industry. The innovation model of these firms is characterized by low investment in R&D, little capabilities for autonomous innovation and dependence from knowledge suppliers belonging to different sectors. The empirical analysis, carried out over the 1996–2014 period at the EU NUTS2 level, shows that between industry variety has a greater impact than within industry variety for the innovative performance of firms.

Determinants of Innovation in Small Manufacturing Firms: Evidence from the South African Business Innovation Survey

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors that influence innovation activities in small manufacturing sector firms. The constructs employed in this paper are assembled into general firm characteristics, organizational structure, firm strategies, and sectoral conditions and relations categories. This study uses 138 responses from small South African firms as contained in the Community Innovation Surveys styled fifth national South African innovation survey, conducted between 2010 and 2012. Appropriate hypotheses were derived and tested by multivariate probit regression analysis. The results show the positive influences of the firm’s age and size by number of employees, a mix of linkages to internal and external knowledge sources, investment in (a) formal R&D department in plant, (b) investment in R&D intensity and (c) a skilled workforce, foreign ownership and government support on the propensity to innovate. Some knowledge source linkages, size of the firm by turnover and the size of the degreed workforce show a negative influence. The generalisability of the findings may be limited by the fact that the present study was focussed on small manufacturing sector firms that responded to the fifth national South African innovation survey. Prior South African studies on the determinants of innovations were based on the first and second national innovation surveys. The findings of this study offer a more recent insight into innovation strategies in small firms. Finally, very little is known about the innovation activities in small firms in Sub Saharan Africa in general, and South Africa specifically. A further implication of this study is that the findings also help stakeholders consider a variety of relationships that are likely to improve the innovation performance of small firms are suggested and discussed.

Green Public Procurement and the Innovation Activities of Firms

This paper provides first empirical insights on the relationship between green public procurement (GPP) and firms' innovation activities. Considering that the public sector is a large buyer in the economy, public procurement is able to work as demand-pull factor for new products and thus innovations - given that the procurement is aimed at such objectives. GPP is specifically implemented to contribute to more sustainable production and consumption. Using a novel firm-level dataset, this paper analyses whether GPP is able to trigger innovation activities within firms, and if so, whether these innovations are environmental innovations or not. The results show some support for a demand-pull effect of GPP on the probability of general product innovations but no conclusive evidence is found for environmental innovations.

Concordance and Complementarity in Intellectual Property Instruments

This work investigates the relationship between proxies of innovation activities, such as patents and trademarks, and firm performance in terms of revenues and growth. By resorting to the virtual universe of Italian manufacturing firms we provide a rather complete picture of the innovation activities of Italian firms, in terms of patents and trademarks, and we study whether the two instruments for protecting Intellectual Property (IP) exhibit complementarity or substitutability. In addition, and to our knowledge novel, we propose a measure of concordance (or proximity) between the patents and trademarks owned by the same firm and we then investigate whether such concordance appears to exert any effect on performance.

The Impact of Global Crisis on the Innovative Processes in Sustainable Development of Russia as a Resource-Mining Country

The global crisis processes that began in 2008 are special, as they signify a change in the epoch shift – from industrial to post-industrial, with a radical reduction in the negative impact on nature and a careful attitude to non-renewable natural resources. The innovations arising during this period affect all spheres of sustainable development – from environmental and technological to economic and social ones. The penetration of global crisis processes into Russian economy has reduced the demand for innovative products, has reoriented investments to maintain output volumes instead of improving the environmental performance of production. The negative consequences of the crisis in Russia include reducing the chances of survival for emerging innovative enterprises, reducing the share of regions that have taken the path of sustainable development, when industrial output growth does not worsen the ecological situation. Therefore, the relevance of an accurate analysis of the factors influencing the global crisis on the innovative development of industry, defining prospects for reducing resource use and investing in environmental protection measures, is greater than ever. In this article, a factor analysis of the impact of the crisis on the innovation activities of Russian industrial firms in the crisis years of 2008 and 2015 was carried out based on data on the main indicators of the enterprises activities. The authors highlighted a number of independent factors influencing crises on sustainable development, with special attention paid to innovative human potential.

Product innovation and firm performance in transition economies: A multi-stage estimation approach

Using Business Environment Enterprise Performance Surveys (BEEPS), this paper provides a multistage empirical analysis of product innovation and firm performance in transition economies (TEs). The Crepon-Duguet-Mairesse (CDM) model, a four-stage approach, is used to investigate the innovation-performance relationship. The multistage model allows studying the innovation activities of firms through multi-interrelated factors while controlling the issue of simultaneity and causality. The paper contributes to the research in this area by estimating the effect of innovation on performance through multistage equation modeling. It fills the gap in providing an understanding of factors that influence on product innovation - firm performance relationship in transition economies. This research is among the first to use product-only innovation to measure the impact of innovation on firms' performance. Findings indicate that product innovation has a positive impact on firm performance in transition economies, complemented by significant impact of specific control variables such as size, total labor cost, capital of the firm. Whereas age and competition from the informal sector, have a negative and significant effect on performance.

Firm Characteristics and Innovation Activity: A Study of Italian Family Firms

Increasingly, innovation is seen as a novel leverage tool with which to create business and social value and thereby place its finders and users at a competitive advantage. Contemporary research suggests that the determinants of the innovation activity of firms are numerous. In this paper, we consider the financial and governance characteristics that might influence the innovation activity of a sample of 700 family firms in Italy. Our study was conducted over a 10-year period, from 2007 to 2016, using panel analysis models alongside robustness tests for the lagging effect and the probability regression as well as diagnostic statistics to ensure the use of an appropriate model. The results show that the existence of institutional investors, as a proxy for governance, has a persistent positive relationship with patent value, as a proxy for innovation, but not with the likelihood of being innovative. Moreover, financial indicators such as net working capital, earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, debt, and equity are found to explain innovation activity better than other indicators in both the panel and probability regressions. We also find very little significant difference between the sectors and regions featured in the study, suggesting that the relationship among them is quasi-systematic. Concluding the paper, our findings are discussed in relation to their policy implications and suggestions for further research are made.