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1.
In the defence industry the recent development of a ‘market for technology’, the creation of new European high-technology companies as well as transformations in government agencies have driven firms to reposition their technological and organizational skills. Our objective is to show that the transformations that have occurred in the past 10 years have not only redefined skills and the organization of production, but also have given a more strategic place to knowledge management (KM) practices. We provide a contextual and historical overview based on qualitative interviews, in order to better understand the relation between KM and innovative behaviour in this industry. We build an original industrial and technological database comprising various samples that provides quantitative information concerning KM and innovative practices. The results of the statistical analysis reveal the specificity of firms in this industry. Taking account of the size of these firms and their technological intensity, we show that the behaviour of defence industry firms in terms of KM practices, differs from that of other firms. This is evident from their technological performance, and innovation and patenting intensity. This structural tendency is explained as an innovative behaviour in the French national innovation system rather than merely a ‘trend’.  相似文献   

2.
We relate innovation to sales growth for incumbent firms in high-tech sectors. A firm, on average, experiences only modest growth and may grow for a number of reasons that may or may not be related to innovative activity. However, given that the returns to innovation are highly skewed and that growth rates distributions are heavy-tailed, it may be misleading to use regression techniques that focus on the ‘average effect for the average firm’. Using a quantile regression approach, we observe that innovation is of crucial importance for a handful of ‘superstar’ fast-growth firms.  相似文献   

3.
In examining the distinctive contributions of foreign subsidiaries and domestic firms to innovative performance in Dutch manufacturing, the paper shows that foreign ownership is an important factor in explaining inter-firm differences affecting innovativeness. It characterizes innovativeness by distinguishing between products that are new to the firm (‘imitative’ innovations), and those products that are new to the market (‘real’ innovations). It uses firm-level data for 4780 firms which took part in the Community Innovation Survey (CIS-2) for 1996 in The Netherlands. It concludes that foreign subsidiaries are more innovative, they are more likely to introduce ‘imitative’ as well as ‘real’ innovations compared to domestic firms. In comparison with the population of innovative companies, however, there is greater heterogeneity among foreign subsidiaries, i.e. they are not more likely to introduce ‘real’ innovations if they cannot utilize knowledge transfer from an associated company.  相似文献   

4.
Research on technological partnerships has traditionally sought explanation of their high failure rates in partner characteristics and relationship features. This study introduces the notion of a ‘bumpy road’ in technology partnerships which refers to undesired outcomes such as ‘partnership mal-functioning’ and ‘instability’ to the degree to which innovation activities are hampered. We explain how firm-level strategies can reduce the probability of a ‘bumpy road’ in partnerships. We also assess the impact of this ‘bumpy road’ on innovative performance. We find that firms that excel in diversification of external activities (in terms of different types of partners) perform best. Moreover, a persistent product oriented innovation strategy geared at developing new products, new markets, or higher product quality will yield more stable partnership outcomes. Our results confirm that engagement in partnerships is beneficial for innovative performance. However, firms that experienced a ‘bumpy road’ in their technological partnerships have to pay a price in terms of a negative effect on their innovative performance.  相似文献   

5.
This paper presents an empirical analysis of the determinants of research cooperation between firms and Public research organisations (PROs) for a sample of innovating small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The econometric analysis is based on the results of the KNOW survey carried out in seven EU countries during 2000. In contrast to earlier works that provide information about the importance of PROs’ research, we know the number of firm/PRO collaborative research and development (R&D) projects. This allows us to study the determinants of firm collaboration with PROs in terms of both the propensity of a firm to undertake R&D projects with a university (do they cooperate or not) and the extent of this collaboration (number of R&D projects). Two questions are addressed. Which firms cooperated with PROs? And what are the firm characteristics that might explain the number of R&D projects with PROs? The results of our analysis point to two major phenomena. First, the propensity to forge an agreement with an academic partner depends on the ‘absolute size’ of the industrial partner. Second the openness of firms to the external environment, as measured by their willingness to search, screen and signal, significantly affects the development of R&D projects with PROs. Our findings suggest that acquiring knowledge through the screening of publications and involvement in public policies positively affects the probability of signing an agreement with a PRO, but not the number of R&D projects developed. In fact, firms that outsource research and development, and patent to protect innovation and to signal competencies show higher levels of collaboration.  相似文献   

6.
Since Teece's seminal paper explaining who were the gainers from technological innovation, increased globalization and the information and communication technology revolution have brought new ways for firms to organize and appropriate from innovation. A new more open model of innovation suggests that firms can benefit from sources of innovation that stem from outside the firm. The central theme of this paper is how firms try to unlock communities as complementary assets. These communities exist outside firm boundaries beyond ownership or hierarchical control. Because of practices developed by communities to protect their work, firms need to assign individuals to work in these communities in order to gain access to developments and, to an extent, influence the direction of the community. Using network analysis we show that some software firms sponsor individuals to act strategically within a free and open source software (FOSS) community. Firm sponsored individuals interact with more individuals than interact with them, and also they seek to interact with central individuals in the community. However, we can see differences in how individuals interact, depending on whether their affiliation is with a dedicated FOSS firm or an incumbent in the software industry. Apparently, some firm managers believe they need ‘a man on the inside’ to be able to gain access to communities.  相似文献   

7.
This paper aims to contribute to the literature on the long-debated relationship between market competition and firm research and development (R&D) by investigating the effect of competitive market pressure on firms’ incentives to invest in R&D. The paper shows that a firm's R&D response to competitive market pressure depends primarily on its level of technological competence or R&D productivity: firms with high levels of technological competence tend to respond aggressively (i.e., exhibit a higher level of R&D efforts) to intensifying competitive market pressure, while firms with low levels of technological competence tend to respond submissively (i.e., exhibit a lower level of R&D efforts). The differential effect of competitive market pressure on firm R&D, conditioned primarily by the level of firms’ technological competence, is empirically supported by unique firm-level data from the World Bank. Furthermore, the role of firm-specific technological competence in conditioning the R&D-competition relationship is more evident and statistically more significant for firms facing consumers whose utility is relatively more elastic to product quality than to price.  相似文献   

8.
Ownership and firm innovation in a transition economy: Evidence from China   总被引:8,自引:0,他引:8  
We examine innovation performance of firms in a transition economy from an ownership perspective. We focus specifically on the relationship between ownership structures and firm innovation performance. Drawing on data from 548 Chinese firms we find volume of patent registration to be most strongly influenced by foreign ownership in the firm along with firm affiliation within a business group. The influence of state and institutional ownership on innovation performance is positive but lagged. Contrary to expectations, insider ownership leads to lower innovation performance and concentrated ownership has no significant impact. Our study has two principal contributions. Firstly, we utilize a comprehensive treatment of ownership characteristics, overcoming weakness in previous studies that have used a more narrow focus on ownership type. Secondly, we contribute to understanding of how firms in transition economies build ‘indigenous’ capabilities for innovation by drawing attention to the interplay of foreign and domestic control of agents’ innovation.  相似文献   

9.
In this paper, we distinguish between firm-level learning effects that result from ‘first-order’ and ‘second-order’ additionalities in innovation policy interventions. ‘First-order’ additionalities represent direct firm-level R&D subsidies, whereas ‘second-order’ additionalities result from knowledge spill-overs, horizontal knowledge exchanges between firms, and from other meso- or community-level effects. Analyzing data from collaborative R&D programs in Finland, we show that enhancing identification with a community of practice among R&D program participants (proxy for second-order additionality) enhances firm-level learning outcomes beyond those resulting from direct R&D subsidy (proxy for first-order additionality). Learning effects facilitated by second-order additionality are not confined to technological learning alone, encompassing also business and market learning. We also show that aspects of program implementation enhance identification with a community of practice, which then mediate the relationship between program implementation and firm-level learning outcomes.  相似文献   

10.
What hampers innovation? Revealed barriers versus deterring barriers   总被引:1,自引:0,他引:1  
Innovating firms are likely to face several challenges and experience different types of barriers. In this paper we argue that it is necessary to distinguish between two kinds of barriers to innovation. The first corresponds to what we describe as revealed barriers and reflects the degree of difficulty of the innovation process and the learning experience consequent on the firm engaging in innovation activity. The second type of impediment, which we label deterring barriers, encompasses the obstacles that prevent firms from committing to innovation. We use data from the 4th UK Community Innovation Survey (CIS4) to investigate the relationship between firms’ engagement in innovation and their assessment of the barriers to innovation. We show that the relationship is curvilinear in the case of costs and market barriers. These results have important implications for innovation policy and innovation management.  相似文献   

11.
This empirical study analyzes the patterns of innovation within and across industries using firm-level survey data from Finland and Denmark. The theoretical starting point is evolutionary theory with its premise that firms in different technological regimes pursue different paths to innovation. Similar modes of behaviour are found in the two datasets, and they closely correspond to those found in earlier studies. Contrary to prevailing assumptions, however, the results show that industries are not at all uniform in terms of how firms innovate; in almost all four- or five-digit NACE industries, three or more different modes of innovation can be identified. This suggests that firms’ strategic differentiation or local search activities overcome pressures in the technological environment towards homogenous behaviour, at least in the short term.  相似文献   

12.
Barriers to innovation have mainly been studied in a single country context. This paper studies differences in the perception of innovation barriers between innovative and non-innovative firms for 18 EU countries. The countries are grouped by their distance to the technological frontier using Community Innovation Surveys for the years 2002–2004 and 2004–2006. The results show that knowledge barriers related to the availability of skilled labour, innovation partners and technological knowledge are more important for firms located in countries close to the frontier, while the opposite is true regarding the availability of external finance. Moreover, while the share of innovators decreases with the distance to the technological frontier, the share of firms not interested or in no need of innovation increases. This is consistent with the idea that as firms approach the technological frontier, they increasingly need to focus on the creation of own knowledge and the adoption of innovation-based growth strategies to stay competitive.  相似文献   

13.
Sectoral patterns of small firm innovation, networking and proximity   总被引:1,自引:0,他引:1  
Drawing upon a sample of 597 small and medium-sized manufacturing firms, this article investigates the extent to which cooperation for innovation is associated with firm-level product and process ‘innovativeness’ and, where collaborative relationships are reported, the factors which influence their spatial distribution. With respect to the former issue, the data suggests considerable variety of association across Pavitt’s [Research Policy 13 (1994) 343] sectoral taxonomy and innovation type. However, the data also indicates the need for caution when developing network strategies or policies: the evidence presented here is unequivocal in noting that innovation is neither a necessary nor less a sufficient condition for innovation. Moreover, internal resources often act as complements to, or indeed appears to negate the need for, external resources. With regards to the spatial distribution of firm linkages, it appears that increasing firms size and export propensity are positively associated with external linkages at a higher spatial level. Moreover, the spatial reach of innovation-related linkages is also likely to be greater for firms reporting the introduction of relatively novel innovations (i.e. products or processes which are new to the industry). In contrast, smaller firms and firms engaged in incremental product innovations appear more likely to be locally embedded.  相似文献   

14.
Most firms use secrecy to protect their knowledge from potential imitators. However, the theoretical foundations for secrecy have not been well explored. We extend knowledge protection literature and propose theoretical mechanisms explaining how information visibility influences the importance of secrecy as a knowledge protection instrument. Building on mechanisms from information economics and signaling theory, we postulate that secrecy is more important for protecting knowledge for firms that have legal requirements to reveal information to shareholders. Furthermore, we argue that this effect is contingent on the location in a technological cluster, on a firm’s investment in fixed assets and on a firm’s past innovation performance. We test our hypotheses using a representative sample of 683 firms in Germany between 2005 and 2013. Our results support the moderation effect of a technological cluster and a firm’s investment in fixed assets. Our findings inform both academics and managers on how firms balance information disclosure requirements with the use of secrecy as a knowledge protection instrument.  相似文献   

15.
The innovation value chain (IVC) divides the innovation process into three separate links or activities: knowledge gathering, knowledge transformation and knowledge exploitation. Here, we report a comparative panel data analysis of the IVC in Ireland and Switzerland. Both economies are small, very open and depend significantly on innovation to maintain competitive advantage. In recent years, however, R&D and innovation growth in Ireland has been markedly stronger than that in Switzerland. We investigate these differences through the ‘lens’ of the IVC. Significant similarities exist between some aspects of firms’ innovation behaviour in each country: strong complementarities emerge between external knowledge sources and between firms’ internal and external knowledge. And, in both countries, in-house R&D and links to customers prove important drivers of innovation. Innovation drives productivity growth in different ways in the two countries, however, through product change in Switzerland and through process change in Ireland. Other differences in the determinants of innovation performance linked to ownership and firms’ institutional context emphasise the systemic nature of innovation and the legacy of past patterns of industrial development.  相似文献   

16.
This paper shows that firm heterogeneity in technological competence, rather than differences in industry-specific characteristics, is the primary condition determining the long-debated relationship between firm size and R&D. Specifically, by utilizing a formal model of firm R&D that shows that profit-maximizing firm R&D intensity is determined jointly by firm-specific technological competence and consumer preference regarding quality and price, this paper suggests that firm size affects firm R&D intensity not directly, but through its influence on firm-specific technological competence. In particular, four predictions are drawn and tested empirically: (1) in general, the size-R&D relationship is less-than-proportional or inverted U-shaped, especially for low-technological-competence firms; (2) however, the common less-than-proportional relationship disappears, and a more-than-proportional relationship becomes increasingly likely, for firms with high levels of technological competence, plausibly due to competence-enhancing, learning economies of scale and/or scope in R&D; (3) firms with larger accumulated R&D experience are, ceteris paribus, less likely to exhibit the common less-than-proportional relationship; (4) among industries, a greater within-industry departure from the proportional size-R&D relationship is expected for industries with seemingly high, rapidly changing technological-opportunity conditions. These predictions, especially pertaining to the conditioning role of technological competence in the size-R&D relationship, are empirically supported by the unique data by the World Bank.  相似文献   

17.
Most analyses of the relationship between spatial clustering and the technological learning of firms have emphasised the influence of the former on the latter, and have focused on intra-cluster learning as the driver of innovative performance. This paper reverses those perspectives. It examines the influence of individual firms’ absorptive capacities on both the functioning of the intra-cluster knowledge system and its interconnection with extra-cluster knowledge. It applies social network analysis to identify different cognitive roles played by cluster firms and the overall structure of the knowledge system of a wine cluster in Chile. The results show that knowledge is not diffused evenly ‘in the air’, but flows within a core group of firms characterised by advanced absorptive capacities. Firms’ different cognitive roles include some—as in the case of technological gatekeepers—that contribute actively to the acquisition, creation and diffusion of knowledge. Others remain cognitively isolated from the cluster, though in some cases strongly linked to extra-cluster knowledge. Possible implications for policy are noted.  相似文献   

18.
This paper explores the relationship between innovation and the survival probability of manufacturing firms in the Netherlands, conditional on firm age and size. The empirical analysis combines firm level data on innovation, derived from the second Community Innovation Survey, and on the date of exit, from the Business Register of all firms active in the Netherlands. To estimate the survival probability of a firm we use a non-parametric approach, based on the calculation of Transition Probability Matrices over different time periods. The results show that innovation has a positive and significant effect on the probability of firms’ survival. This effect increases over time and is conditional on firm age and size; we observe that small and young firms are the most exposed to the risk of exit, as found in earlier studies, but also those that most benefit of innovation to survive in the market, especially in the longer term.  相似文献   

19.
Elena Huergo 《Research Policy》2006,35(9):1377-1388
The objective of this study is to amplify the scarce empirical evidence about the effect of technological management on innovation. At the same time, the investigation is intended to examine whether the scale of production by itself stimulates technological activity and/or it acts as a proxy of other determinants of innovation. The estimation of an innovation production function with a panel of Spanish manufacturing firms shows that the planning and monitoring of the innovation process and the hiring of personnel with special skills for technological activities are significant sources of innovation, although with important differences regarding the type of innovation (process versus product). In addition, the evidence suggests that large firms’ advantages for the generation of product innovations are related to a different use and effectiveness of technological management mechanisms.  相似文献   

20.
Phil Cooke 《Research Policy》2005,34(8):1128-1149
This paper proposes to review and assess social scientific debate about the origins and nature of innovation in modern society. It focuses on three sub-sets of conceptualisation, critique and commentary that refer specifically to sub-national or regional innovation systems. Research in the latter field has grown enormously in recent years. Moreover, new perspectives from other disciplines than regional science have been promoted. One distinctive view of relevance in that it is focused on the role in innovation of specific ‘entrepreneurial universities’ in relation to industry and government is, of course, the ‘Triple Helix’ approach. This is reviewed and sympathetically critiqued. A second view, less sympathetically critiqued here, is one that itself attacks all so-called ‘new regionalism’ for stressing the importance of institutions, industry embeddedness and the micro-science of regional economic development. Dazzled by ‘Globalisation 1’ and the totalising power of ‘scale’ geographies, this rejection of the worth of spatial analysis at less than the global or national ‘scalar envelope’ is assessed for its potential insights into weaknesses of the regional innovation systems approach but found wanting in both technical accuracy and scholarly competence. Finally, the state of the art in regional innovation systems research is sketched by reference both to recent longitudinal findings and elaborations into specific technological fields, particularly but not only Bioregional Innovation Systems that help move us towards a newer theory of economic geography in the knowledge economy, based on ‘regional knowledge capabilities.’ The analysis conclusively proposes ‘Globalisation 2’, a ‘ground-up’ knowledge-driven evolution of the earlier ‘top-down’ multilateral trade institution and corporately driven ‘Globalisation 1.’  相似文献   

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