International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management

Studies show that actors who are directly involved with science, technology and innovation (STI), such as scientists and managers, are more likely to participate. Therefore, policy documents, as an important guiding factor, need to emphasize the engagement of various stakeholders. On the other hand, due to the need for innovative models in public engagement, social innovation has provided new ways to promote it. Therefore, this study aims to strengthen public engagement in STI policies through social innovation in Iran.

In order to data gathering, questionnaires, interviews, document analysis and literature review were used in different stages of the research. In the first step, after interviewing experts on the dimensions and components of public engagement in STI, in the context of macro-policy documents, a model was extracted using thematic analysis and fuzzy delphi techniques. Then, in the second step, this study identified the statements related to public engagement in STI in macro-policy documents using quantitative content analysis, and thus the degree of attention to public engagement in STI macro-policy documents was determined. In the next step, this study sought to find solutions to its weaknesses in STI by examining the opinions of knowledgeable people about public engagement methods. Then, these solutions were evaluated in terms of their relevance to the Iranian context and social innovativeness, and finally, the selected solutions were ranked by Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method.

Consistent with the resource-based view research on investment syndicates indicates relative performance advantages of syndicate-backed ventures. However, in line with agency theory, the literature shows that heterogeneous syndicates between independent venture capital (IVC) and corporate venture capital (CVC) produce portfolio firms that exert only marginal growth and are less likely to exit successfully. These contrasting views motivate this study, which aims to shed light on the determinants of value creation for new venture firms in IVC–CVC co-investing. Our qualitative research builds on a cross-industry sample of 35 interviewees identifying a distinctive set of value drivers comprising shareholder relationships, corporate setup, venture life cycle, and deal terms.

Technological interventions are adopted in emerging economies to enable sustainable development and empower marginalized communities at the Base of the Pyramid (BoP). Emerging economies are becoming significant contributors in BoP development with the active initiatives from academia-driven organizations engaging in rural development. However, the technological development practice is fragmented and requires unified technology management practices to analyze salient features that lead to a sustainable rural transformation. This study adopts a case-study methodology and obtains primary and secondary data from two distinctive centers of an academia-born organization. The findings enfold three intrinsic characteristics of the technology development process targeted for the BoP sector: the emergence of demand-driven technology, inclusive innovation practices leading towards self-reliance and trends of sustainable green technology. The formative contribution of this research enriches the management of technologies at BoP by connecting the developer’s perspective for innovation practice inclined towards knowledge sharing, inclusiveness, empowerment and sustainable development, thus creating a roadmap for effective policy development focusing on the sustainability of BoP technologies in emerging economies.

This study explores how China’s solar photovoltaic (PV) industry can catch up so rapidly without radical technological innovation. Through the grounded theory method, we found it was the industrial innovation ecosystem construction and industrial innovation ecological relationship maintenance that made China’s solar PV industry gain competitive advantages. From the perspective of the industrial innovation ecosystem, clustering and colocation provided a foundation for industrial innovation ecosystem construction. China’s solar PV enterprises maintain the ecological relationship among the actors of the industrial innovation ecosystem through several ecological strategies, including resource orchestration and co-opetition. Hub firms played an important role in overcoming the liability of newness and putting forward the vision of shared fate in the early stage of industry development. Local governments and industry associations provided institutional support, coordination, and intermediary to enterprises.

Purpose: Our paper intends to bring systematic attention to the transaction costs and corresponding governance structures in the corporate R&D contexts. Design/methodology/approach: The current conversation on the governance of R&D has addressed topics related to investments, resource allocation, knowledge sharing, or managing intellectual property rights. While these are important aspects of innovation cost and benefit, they do not address an equally important issue of transaction cost arising out of human behavior. We adopt a systematic synthesis of 16 qualitative teaching case studies to validate the existence of human behavior-related transaction cost issues in the context of R&D and identify firms’ governance responses to mitigate or eliminate their effect. Findings: Our findings suggest that transaction costs issues can be mitigated by appropriate governance models ranging from centralized R&D to open innovation. While structure mitigates the transaction cost some ex-ante and ex-post controls may also be required. Practical implications: For management practice, the insights of our study provide evidence-based advice for R&D managers regarding the practical, effective ways of limiting and controlling the transaction costs associated with R&D activity. Originality/value: This paper uses teaching-case studies to analyze a variety of transaction cost dilemmas in the R&D context and brings in a new perspective to R&D governance.

In today’s economy, information technology is present in all aspects of life and has the potential to be used for the development of society. The study aims to find hidden connections between the evolution of poverty in developing countries and information technology. The methodology of the study is based on the monitoring of statistical data from the world atlas Knoema, which characterizes the economic development of countries and the level of poverty, as well as data from the International Telecommunication Union, which characterizes the level of development of information technology in countries around the world. As a result of the study, the evolutionary changes of gross domestic product and the development of information technology were traced, with the subsequent establishment of a relationship between them, confirmed on the basis of the method of rating scores. Finally, a comparative analysis was made to identify the causal links between the evolution of poverty and information technology through the precise indicators that Knoema and the International Telecommunication Union collect to trace the regulatory environment within a country such as the affordability of ICT services, ICT literacy, and the poverty rate. It was found that despite the availability of information technology price policy in developing countries and the uneven growth of GDP mainly in post-Soviet countries, except for the period of the COVID-19 crisis, gaps were identified in the form of low or no ICT literacy at poverty thresholds of 3.8–9.8%. This demonstrates the hidden links between poverty and population’s practical knowledge of information technology, and may constrain the socio-economic development of developing countries. The findings can be used by policymakers as a tool to combat poverty, and are also useful to scholars and economists who work on the digitalization of the population and inclusive education.

This paper examines the relationship between the perceived team climate for innovations and the experience of flow and worry and the moderating effect of team size. The research contains a multi-organization dataset with 323 software product development team members. The results show that the perceived climate for innovation is significantly positively related to the experience of flow and worry. However, the findings did not support the moderation with no differences in working in smaller or larger teams. This study indicates that the perceived climate for innovations positively relates to positive and negative individual effects without the importance of team size.

This paper examines the link between the composition of university entrepreneurial ecosystems and performance of higher education institutions (HEIs) in academic entrepreneurship, specifically founding academic spinoff companies. The paper studies a sample of 160 UK HEIs and their university entrepreneurial ecosystems related to formation of 784 academic spinoffs. It employs social network analysis (SNA) to inspect the composition and connections between university entrepreneurial ecosystems. It finds that HEIs based in better developed university entrepreneurial ecosystems are associated with formation of greater numbers of academic spinoff companies. The best performing ecosystems are based in the Greater South East region. It is concluded that policymakers need to recognize the importance of the composition of the university entrepreneurial ecosystems and the role it plays in academic entrepreneurship.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a suitable formative scale for Industry 4.0 readiness assessment and validate in the Indian steel manufacturing sector. For this, a literature review was undertaken to identify the relevant dimensions and items to assess the Industry 4.0 readiness at micro-level. Further, a pilot study and content validity were undertaken with experts from the industry and academia to find out the relevance of the dimensions and their items. The index thus developed was administered among top-level managers from steel manufacturing organizations and the data was analyzed using PLS-SEM. The findings revealed the most important parameters — strategy & organization; business model; manufacturing & operations; supply chain; products & services along with 21 indicators to be significant in all cases to assess Industry 4.0 readiness.

In this paper, we explore preparedness strategies for the initial response to crisis-driven innovation, in the context of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Using insights from semi-structured interviews with public health strategists, we apply analytic induction to investigate preparedness to innovate, and the main forms of crisis-driven innovation applied in the initial COVID-19 response. We thematically analyze measures of preparedness for the initial COVID-19 response and propose a framing aimed at boosting readiness for crisis-driven innovation. Our study finds themes on COVID-19 preparedness strategies involving combat-inspired public policies from assessed security, cyclic-oriented public projections of actionable safeguards, and continuity-driven public provisions for anticipated situations. The study also captures themes on crisis response as crisis-driven innovation in relation to digitalized, integrated, and tailored public services, initiatives, and systems. Our paper concludes with discussions on the implications of innovation intelligence for crisis preparedness, “ripple-inspired inside-out” view of crisis-driven innovation, “response as innovation” framings, and suggestions for further studies.

Health systems were severely strained at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, where the demand for personal protection equipment (PPE) could not be met. The challenge faced by many countries was how to innovate quickly to create PPE and other needed solutions. The subsequent research gap identified was a lack of practical insights on how to support such novel technology adoption, particularly those that stem from Industry 4.0 (I4.0) within a developing world context. To address this previous literature on I4.0 technology, the role of innovation environments and theoretical principles of technology adoption was reviewed. A practical case from an academic makerspace based in a South African university was then assessed. It was selected due to its direct role in rapid solutions development of PPE using additive manufacturing (AM) until such a time that manufacturers could set up production on a larger scale. It was found that AM and other novel technologies have facilitated innovative solutions to address the significant impacts of the pandemic. Key to which were practices identified of an innovation environment that supported early-stage adoption of AM to achieve this even in a developing country context. The findings imply that innovation environments offer an agile platform to leverage innovation by streamlining certain critical success factors of I4.0 technology adoption, which is presented in a model. However, individual skills developed by such environments to enhance innovation capabilities within this paradigm require further research.

The gastronomy sector was one of the industries most fundamentally affected by the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions and the subsequent disruption of demand. Entrepreneurs were challenged to secure their survival. This study aims to analyze how COVID-19 has accelerated digital technologies in the hospitality industry. The study assumes that due to lockdowns successful restaurants in Baden–Wuerttemberg have developed new digital business models. Data for the quantitative study were collected through a survey among randomly selected restaurants carried out between December 2020 and February 2021. A cluster analysis is used to identify different types of restaurants concerning their propensity to innovate and their success. Results of the study show that the level of digitization is one important factor regarding the range of entrepreneurial success.

This study examines how the mobility of engineers in the semiconductor industry changed after COVID-19. Through the analysis of patent data, differences in the impact on the probability of engineers moving across borders before and after the outbreak were compared. The analysis reveals that before the outbreak, the probability of engineers moving internationally was higher for top-ranked engineers, who accounted for 1% of all engineers, than that for second-, third-, and lowest-ranked engineers. However, after the outbreak, behavioral changes were observed only in top-ranked engineers, so they had a lower probability of mobility than any other rank of engineers.