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This study explores the use of web content analysis to build innovation indicators from the complete texts of 79 corporate websites of Canadian nanotechnology and advanced materials firms. Indicators of four core concepts (R&D, IP protection, collaboration and external financing) of the innovation process were built using keywords frequency analysis. These web-based indicators were validated using several indicators built from a classic questionnaire-based survey with the following methods: correlation analysis, Multi-Traits Multi-Methods (MTMM) matrices and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Results suggest that formative indices built with the questionnaire and web-based indicators measure the same concept, which is not the case when considering the items from the questionnaire separately. Web-based indicators can act either as complements to direct measures or as substitutes for broader measures, notably the importance of R&D and the importance of IP protection, which are normally measured using conventional methods such as government administrative data or questionnaire-based surveys.

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In this exploratory study, we use a web mining technique to source data in order to create innovation indicators of Canadian nanotechnology and advanced materials firms. 79 websites were extracted and analysed based on keywords related to the concepts of R&D and intellectual property. To understand what our web mining indicators actually measure, we compare them with those from a classic questionnaire-based survey. Formative indices from the surveys variables were built to better represent all the possibilities resulting from the web mining indicators. A MTMM matrix lead us to conclude that the formative indices are a good representation of the web mining indicators. As a consequence, the data extracted via our web mining technique can be used as proxies for the relative importance of R&D and the importance of IP, which would have previously only been measured using conventional methods such as government administrative data or questionnaire-based surveys.