International Journal of Innovation Management

The collaboration for developing research and development (R&D) projects highlights the importance to access new external knowledge. Drawing from a mixed-methods approach in a sample of projects carried out by Spanish firms, our key findings show that every project’s dimension of absorptive capacity is related to collaborative performance in different ways. Organisations with capability difficulties to transform external knowledge enhanced their R&D projects’ outcomes by collaborating more intensively. However, it is the ability to exploit that external knowledge into innovation which could be the key to obtain outcomes and support to R&D programs. The regional particularities have showed new ways to collaborate due to the innovation culture in the Middle Ebro Valley.

Do SMEs cluster around different types of innovation activities? Are there patterns of SME innovation activities? To investigate we develop a taxonomy of innovation activities in SMEs using a qualitative study, followed by a survey. First, based upon our qualitative research and literature review we develop a comprehensive list of innovation activities SMEs typically engage in. We then conduct a factor analysis to determine if these activities can be combined into factors. We identify three innovation activity factors: R&D activities, incremental innovation activities and cost innovation activities. We use these factors to identify three clusters of firms engaging in similar innovation activities: active innovators, incremental innovators and opportunistic innovators. The clusters are enriched by validating that they also exhibit significant internal similarities and external differences in their innovation skills, demographics, industry segments and family business ownership. This research contributes to innovation and SME theory and practice by identifying SME clusters based upon their innovation activities.

This paper considers challenges of human resource management (HRM) in open innovation (OI) processes. It examines which strategies managers use to overcome these problems. By conducting an inductive case study of the Brazilian oil and gas company Petrobras based on grounded theory, we developed a framework explaining these challenges and strategies. The paper argues that the most important HR challenges are (a) interpersonal relationships, (b) power shifting inside the organization, and (c) creating a sense of value among workers, and explains how managers tackled all these challenges to build a better working environment. The deep analysis of HRM challenges in OI contributes to a better understanding of management problems these processes can cause and how these could be overcome.

It has become imperative for researchers to mark out the institutional limits and conditions within which innovation is the most useful strategy and to establish the extent to which its efficacy is conditioned by innovative culture and leadership of the service firm. This paper makes contribution to the service innovation literature by showing the internal boundary conditions under which service innovation can effectively enhance the competitiveness of the service firm. An empirical research design comprised two sets of data collected from service managers; the first for validation and the second for structural analysis of our framework. Five service innovation dimensions were found and that innovation leadership partially mediated the relationship between the service innovations and a service firm’s competitiveness. Innovative culture also mediates the service innovations and competitiveness. In contrast to previous studies which examined the direct effect of innovation on competitiveness, our study found that the mediating role of internal conditions brings about complementarity of strategic assets which produces sustainable competitive advantage to the service firm. The practical implication is that service firms must be equally interested in creating a fundamental service philosophy through their culture and leadership to build competitive advantages.

Prior research on the modularity–performance nexus is heavily biased towards product innovation, leaving the impact of modularity on other types of innovation such as business model innovation unknown. This study seeks to address this gap. To do so, we develop and test a parsimonious model which examines whether a firm’s pursuit of business model innovation serves as a salient conduit through which modular product and process translate to firm performance. In addition, we examine environmental dynamism as a contingency that to further illuminate these associations. Using data from 87 manufacturing SMEs in Australia we find partial support for our model. Specifically, we find that pursuit of BMI is a missing mechanism only in the process modularity-performance nexus not the product modularity. In addition, contrary to predictions, we observe that environmental dynamism negatively moderates this relationship. These findings have important implication for theory and practice of innovation management. We discuss these implications and suggest several directions for future research.

The research and development (R&D) expenditure results in the innovation for any firm but affects the financial performance and riskiness of the firm at the same time. The relation among innovation, the riskiness of the firm and financial performance is discussed in this study. This study determined the impact of innovation on financial performance and also looked into the impact of innovation on riskiness of the firms. This study is conducted on the most innovative firms according to Forbes magazine over the period 1998–2012. Our findings show positive, significant and robust relationship between innovation and financial performance which is consistent with the existing literature. On the other hand, impact of innovation on riskiness is positive and significant which shows that more innovative firms are more riskier and ultimately profitability is increased for those firms.

This study draws on a sample of 49,919 firms from 13 countries to investigate the impact of national culture on the performance of inbound open innovation strategies. The study first validates the curvilinear relationships of external search breadth and depth with innovation performance, as first established by Laursen and Salter (2006) [Laursen, K and A Salter (2006). Open for innovation: The role of openness in explaining innovation performance among U.K. manufacturing firms. Strategic Management Journal, 27(2), 131–150] controlling for a number of country-specific factors including culture and the institutional environment. The study then draws on Hofstede’s cultural framework to theoretically and empirically investigate the influence of a country’s culture on the effectiveness of firms’ search strategies. The results show that cultural factors not only directly impact innovation performance, but also interact with search breadth and depth, thereby moderating the success of inbound open innovation strategies.

Radicalness of innovation is often contingent upon access to technologies whose applications exceed their technological definition (technology distinctness (TD)) and sourcing innovation outside a firm’s focal industry (exterior sourcing (ES)). However, going outside one’s focal industry can be expensive and can lead to inconclusive results. We posit that exterior sourcing and technology distinctness, both have inverse U relationship with radicalness. In addition, we argue that exterior sourcing negatively moderates the relationship between technology distinctness and radicalness such that high technology distinctness, and fewer and focused exterior sourcing will have the strongest relationship with radicalness. To test our assertions, we used patent filings between 1996 and 2009 from the information technology (IT) industry from the standard & Poor’s (S&P) 500 database. The empirical evidence supported our claims. Findings suggest that there is an optimum recombination of exterior sourcing and technology distinctness in which radicalness is maximised. We conclude the paper by summarising the key findings, discussing implications for theory and practice, and suggesting avenues for future research.

In today’s fast changing and extremely competitive business environment, organisations can only survive by realising their employees’ creative and innovative potential. Existing research has demonstrated that there is a positive relationship between emotional intelligence and creativity. To extend our knowledge of this link, this paper investigates whether leaders’ emotional intelligence competencies may enhance and nurture employees’ creative performance and innovative behaviour. The sample comprised 1102 leaders working in different industries throughout Australia, Iran and Malaysia. Findings indicated that leaders’ emotional intelligence competencies positively and significantly affect employees’ creative performance and innovative behaviour in all three nations. The results are discussed and suggestions are made based upon the data analysis and conclusion. Also, the implications of the results are highlighted. Eventually, limitations of the study and possible directions for future research are discussed.

The purpose of the paper is to present the empirical evidence of the innovation capability influencing the operation capability and logistics performance in the Australian courier industry. According to resource-based view, firm capabilities including dynamic capabilities and ordinary capabilities play a vital role in a firm to generate competitive advantages. It is important to understand the role of firm capabilities in order to achieve better performance results. Further, innovation capability is one of the dynamic capabilities, which can be deployed to extend, modify or create the ordinary capability in a firm; operation capability is an ordinary capability in the paper. In addition, the logistics performance is critical for courier firms to deliver value and service to customers. This paper, therefore, gives an attempt to investigate the relationships among innovation capability, operation capability and logistics performance. The results show how innovation capability can coordinate with operation capability in order to influence logistics performance. This provides a starting point for understanding of the role of innovation capability in the Australian courier industry. This has important implications for both managers and academics to improve the logistics performance in the logistics and transport firms. Moreover, the paper makes a contribution to strategic management and innovation management literature.

While collaborative business modeling (CBM) constitutes a promising new approach for opening up a company’s innovation process, existing literature lacks empirical evidence of the effects related to this approach. Drawing on related literature on the quality of creative output, this paper proposes that in the context of a CBM initiative, the integration of customers will improve the quality of the generated output. As indicated by the results of our empirical evaluation, customers are indeed capable of developing high quality business models and are able to outperform company experts when it comes to the task of developing new business models.

This journal article has been retracted from the International Journal of Innovation Management due to plagiarism.

We run through the operation mechanism of open innovation and analyse network crowdsourcing from the perspective of overall innovation system, which considers public providers, corporate requestors, network platforms and virtual crowdsourcing communities throughout the entire operation of network crowdsourcing system. By demonstrating the definition of crowdsourcing capability, we advance towards a capability-perspective for network crowdsourcing system. Crowdsourcing capability is an integrative concept, which has business requestors’ capability, network platform capability and public creativity. On this basis, we study the formation mechanism of crowdsourcing capability from the perspective of knowledge sharing and value network. Overall, it contributes to explaining operation rules of network crowdsourcing system and describing different participant’s collaborative innovation and create value together.

For companies, cooperation represents a way to innovate more effectively. Within this respect, past literature stresses the importance of core network management functions and relational mechanisms for the effectiveness of interorganisational cooperation. However, it is still unclear whether and how core network management functions and relational mechanisms improve a firm’s innovation capability from interorganisational cooperation. Based on data of 154 industrial companies, the results from structural equation modelling provide evidence that core network management functions significantly enhance innovation capability improvement of individual firms by interorganisational cooperation. Furthermore, both formal and informal relational mechanisms partially mediate the impact of core network management functions on innovation capability improvement. With regard to informal relational mechanisms, companies should foster trust, guarantee equal power distribution and ascribe high importance to their cooperation. With regard to formal relational mechanisms, companies should provide organisational support to their cooperation, continuously share knowledge with their partners and also meet and communicate on regular basis.

The external circumstances for universities have been changing rapidly. In order to be competitive, survive and flourish, universities have turned to external sources to generate revenues. The literature refers to this phenomenon as academic capitalism, defined as the involvement of colleges and their faculty in market-like behaviours, which has become a key feature of higher education finances in most countries. As a result, technology transfer, technological commercialisation, and patents via industry–university collaboration represent a source of financial rewards. This paper explores the determinants of financial rewards of universities sourced from academic engagement through industry–university collaboration in South Korea. We have found that technology transfer per employees working at technology licensing offices, participation of engineering faculty, patent approvals, and the number of firms with incubators within universities significantly contributes to university revenues. The following determinants of financial performance are unexpectedly not contributors to revenue: technological commercialisation using technology transfer, distinguished faculty and incentive rules for inventors. In the light of these findings, it appears that an entrepreneurial university program is likely to play a strong role in university finances in Korea.