Product Innovation and the Complementarities of External Interfaces

Abstract

This paper investigates the relationship between new product introduction, and three constructs (search, collaboration and external R&D) developed to capture the different means by which firms link internal R&D to external inputs. By including interaction effects and applying detailed marginal effects analysis, it sheds new light on a research question, which has generated much empirical ambiguity. Search diversity and collaboration diversity measure the extent to which different types of information sources and collaboration partners are used. Both affect innovation performance positively, and are complementary to each other. External R&D measures the relative importance of contract R&D, and is found to have a conditional negative impact which is reduced by search and reinforced when combined with collaboration. When including interaction effects involving the overall R&D intensity of firms, our findings suggest the existence of two competing ideal types of open innovation strategy and organization.

Collaboration in Innovation Between Foreign Subsidiaries and Local Universities: Evidence from Spain

“…According to Yusuf (2007, 17), MNCs have a higher propensity to collaborate with universities than local firms since they "have the information, the finances, the organizational capacity to manage a multifaceted research program, and the commitment to routinized innovation that can induce technology links with universities." However, the few empirical studies that have addressed this question show very mixed results (Britto et al 2013;Chaves do Couto e Silva Neto et al 2013;Ebersberger et al 2011;van Beers, Berghall, and Poot 2008), pointing to a large heterogeneity across host countries, industries and firms. Indeed, it seems logical to expect that the results will differ depending on the host country's technological endowments and as a result of the "cumulativeness" and "path dependency" underlying the strategic orientation of foreign subsidiaries (Benito, Grogaard, and Narula 2003;Cantwell and Mudambi 2005).…”

“…Our dependent variable takes the value 1 if the firm collaborates with one or several Spanish universities and 0 otherwise. Besides considering foreign ownership and group affiliation, we control for firm size, sector of activity and other factors typically used in empirical studies to model firms' propensity to collaborate with universities (Caloghirou, Tsakanikas, and Vonortas 2001;Ebersberger et al 2011;Miotti and Sachwald 2003). These include several variables to assess firms' research and innovation strategies (expenditure in innovation, performance of basic research, access to public R&D funding and intellectual property protection) and other variables related to human capital (expenditure in training and percentage of highly educated employees).…”

“…Among the wide variety of formal and informal mechanisms to link with external sources of knowledge (Hagedoorn, Link, and Vonortas 2000), firms may opt for collaboration in innovation with their suppliers, customers and competitors, as well as with public research institutes and universities. With regard to the latter, which forms the focus of this paper, recent empirical research across a broad range of European countries has found a positive relationship between firms' openness toward the science system and innovation outcomes like sales from new products (Ebersberger et al 2011).…”

“…Although there is a rich body of literature analyzing universityindustry collaboration in innovation, it has been only very recently that some studies have analyzed empirically the interactions between foreign subsidiaries and local universities (e.g. Britto et al 2013; Chaves do Couto e Silva Neto et al 2013;Ebersberger et al 2011). The international business literature has traditionally focused on measuring the spillovers deriving from linkages between foreign subsidiaries and local firms, leaving linkages with universities relatively underexplored (Meyer and Sinani 2009;Nell and Andersson 2012).…”

The effects of production offshoring on R&D and innovation in the home country

“…Dichotomous indicators for product innovation have been used for instance by Ebersberger and Herstad (2011), by Nieto and Santamaria (2007), and by Laursen, Masciarelli, and Prencipe (2012). The economic relevance of product innovation measured by the sales share generated by new products has, for instance, been used by Cassiman and Veugelers (2006), by Laursen and Salter (2006), and by Schmiedeberg (2008).…”