Innovation, Resource-based view of the firm, Cooperation, Technological proximity, Organizational know-how, C30, L14, O32,

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Abstract This paper concerns the regional innovation system approach. It deals with the characteristics of three regional systems, Northern Hesse, Alpes-Maritime and Jena, and focusses on each regional network of innovators. In this context the importance of the size and homogeneity of a regional pool of knowledge spillovers for those networks is analyzed. We find evidence that an increasing regional knowledge base in combination with an increasing homogeneity of this knowledge base enhances the knowledge flows and the incentives for actors to interact with each other. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor mayJEL classification: O31, P25, Q55

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in Networks and innovation: the role of social assets in explaining firms' innovative capacityUwe Cantner*, Elisa Conti** and Andreas Meder*** Abstract. The claim of a positive association between a firm's social assets and its innovative capacity is a widely debated topic in the literature. Although controversial, such an argument has informed recent innovation policy across Germany, increasingly directed to cluster formation. In the light of the growing attention and financial efforts that cluster-based innovation policies are receiving, it is worth answering two main questions. First, are firms with a relatively high level of social capital likely to be more innovative? Second, do companies pursuing innovation in partnership innovate more? This paper empirically answers these questions by exploring a cross-sectoral sample of 248 firms based in the Jena region. On the one hand, the extent to which a firm is integrated in its community life does not contribute to an explanation of its innovative performance. On the other hand, directed cooperation with the specific goal of innovating shows a positive impact on innovative performance. However, the correlation between the extent of the network of co-innovators and firms' innovative capacity presents an inverted U-shaped relation: there is a threshold in the number of co-innovators justified by the costs of innovating by interacting. A policy lesson can be drawn from these findings: cluster-based policies are to be treated with caution as firms face costs of networking and not merely benefits.

There is manifold literature dealing with co-operative activities of firms. However, no empirical study seems to have investigated the factors leading to malfunctions in co-operation projects in terms of a low likelihood of co-operation, low rate of success, and failed co-operation. Our paper attempts to fill this gap by investigating the possible presence of two problems in co-operation: the lack of intermediation and of reciprocity. Based on data gathered for firms in two German regions and one French region, we find that the success of co-operation projects depends on the perceived importance, rather than on the perceived quality, of intermediate actors. Hence, the major problem for intermediating suitable partners is more related to communication than it is a programmatic issue. Trust and reciprocity in co-operation between firms is found to be relevant ex-post in the sense of being a main determinant of failed co-operation projects.JEL classification: O31, O32, P25

Extended abstractEntrepreneurship and innovative behaviour is a non-ubiquitous phenomenon with respect to the actor (the Schumpeterian Entrepreneur), space (innovative milieu), and time (Gruenderzeit). Even though the formal sets of rules and institutions are similar across regions within economies and transaction costs are decreasing over time (which sometimes leads to the hypothesis that geographical distance decreases in importance), there exist agglomeration of innovation and entrepreneurship in space and waves of entrepreneurship with respect to time. Theoretical frameworkWithin this frame we propose an analysis of prior technological knowledge of a firm founder and its impact on further innovative success. Drawing on the theory of the resource-based view of the firm (Penrose 1959), we regard an entrepreneurial start-up as a set of specific resources. As these resources are developed over time and depend on former innovative activities, we assume that an entrepreneur, who already possesses technological know-how at the stage of the firm founding, is more innovative then non-experienced firm founder. Additional to the technological resources, the entrepreneur posses also managerial and cooperative experience. Both are kinds of organizational know-how. These capabilities are developed in a dynamic process over time (Zollo & Winter 2002). Dealing actually with project-based firms Prencipe & Tell (2001) examine the importance of accumulated experience for imitation inside a project. We relate these findings on both dimensions of organizational know-how in a sense