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Recent work on SMEs and networks has emphasised the importance of external cooperative ties in enhancing firms' innovative performance. These external ties provide resource constrained SMEs with access to a wider set of technological opportunities through information sharing and resource pooling. Previous studies of the SME innovationcooperation relationship have used categorical measures to capture tie existence which, while providing some useful insights, largely fail to capture the strength of cooperative relationships and/or the variety of relational directions in which cooperation occurs. This study aims to address this measurement deficiency and explore the SME innovationcooperation relationship by designing and utilising measures that capture both the multiscalar (strength) and multi-dimensional (variety) nature of cooperation and innovation. We then apply these measures to a survey of UK manufacturing SMEs. Data is obtained for 371 SMEs, and we then assess the innovation-cooperation relationship within a multivariate regression framework. We find that the strength of cooperative ties across a range of productive activities within the value chain are important facilitators for SME innovative capability; this is true for both product and process innovation. However, we find that SME cooperation with rivals (co-opetition) has no significant impact upon innovation. Our results have significant implications for both supply chain managers and policy-makers interested in enhancing innovation among SMEs. In particular, we argue that SME innovative activity benefits from good, close dyadic relations within the supply chain, while more generally policy should be geared towards nurturing and sustaining SME innovation networks.

This paper critically assesses recent place-based approaches to industrial and regional policy epitomised in the EU's 2020 'smart specialisation' programme. It suggests that these are a move in the right direction in so far as they acknowledge 'place' as a key, constituent part of policy making. Drawing upon examples from across the world, we emphasise the importance of regions pursuing strategies that allow them to capture -in a sustainable way -a part of the value they help create and co-create with other entities, such as multinational firms and other organisations. This involves policymakers acting as public entrepreneurs, devising and implementing strategies, structures and policies to enable the regional eco-system and its constituent parts to capture value sustainably. In addition to the extant focus on linkages and embeddedness, a key aspect of this involves the adoption of regional value capture and positioning strategies.

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