R&D COLLABORATION FOR ENVIRONMENTAL INNOVATION

Abstract

The literature on the impact of R&D collaboration on innovation performance of firms suggests that R&D collaboration is not always beneficial. Therefore, a more detailed analysis of the effects of R&D collaboration is necessary. This paper investigates the relevance of R&D collaboration with different partner types on a firm's environmental innovation performance. Thereby, product related and process related environmental innovations are distinguished. Firm-level data from 2337 German firms are used in the regression analysis. The results suggest that R&D collaboration with suppliers, customers, universities, governmental research institutes, consultants, and other firms within the same corporate group is positively associated to a firm's process related environmental innovation performance. R&D collaboration with customers, suppliers, other firms within the same corporate group and consultants is positively associated with the development of environmental friendly products.

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