Does combining different types of collaboration always benefit firms? Collaboration, complementarity and product innovation in Norway

Haus-Reve, Silje, Fitjar, Rune Dahl and Rodríguez-Pose, Andrés ORCID: 0000-0002-8041-0856 (2019) Does combining different types of collaboration always benefit firms? Collaboration, complementarity and product innovation in Norway. Research Policy, 48 (6). pp. 1476-1486. ISSN 0048-7333

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Abstract

Product innovation is widely thought to benefit from collaboration with both scientific and supply-chain partners. The combination of exploration and exploitation capacity, and of scientific and experience-based knowledge, are expected to yield multiplicative effects. However, the assumption that scientific and supply-chain collaboration are complementary and reinforce firm-level innovation has not been examined empirically. This paper tests this assumption on an unbalanced panel sample of 8337 firm observations in Norway, covering the period 2006–2010. The results of the econometric analysis go against the orthodoxy. They show that Norwegian firms do not benefit from doing “more of all” on their road to innovation. While individually both scientific and supply-chain collaboration improve the chances of firm-level innovation, there is a significant negative interaction between them. This implies that scientific and supply-chain collaboration, in contrast to what has been often highlighted, are substitutes rather than complements. The results are robust to the introduction of different controls and hold for all tested innovation outcomes: product innovation, new-to-market product innovation, and share of turnover from new products.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2019 The Authors
Divisions:	Geography & Environment
Subjects:	T Technology H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor
JEL classification:	O - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth > O3 - Technological Change; Research and Development > O31 - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives O - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth > O3 - Technological Change; Research and Development > O32 - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D O - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth > O3 - Technological Change; Research and Development > O33 - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
Date Deposited:	26 Mar 2019 11:39
Last Modified:	26 Apr 2024 06:21
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/100330

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