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on Economics of Strategic Management |
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Issue of 2026–04–06
ten papers chosen by João José de Matos Ferreira, Universidade da Beira Interior |
| By: | Drydakis, Nick (Anglia Ruskin University) |
| Abstract: | This study examines whether AI Capital, defined as AI-related knowledge, skills and capabilities, is associated with business innovation among SMEs in England. Using a two-wave longitudinal panel dataset comprising 504 observations from SMEs collected in 2024 and 2025, the study develops and validates a 45-item AI Capital of Business scale. Business innovation is measured across five dimensions: product and service innovation, process innovation, technology adoption, market and customer engagement, and organisational culture and strategy. Regression models, including pooled OLS, Random Effects, and Fixed Effects specifications, are employed. The findings reveal a robust positive association between AI Capital and business innovation across all model specifications. This association holds across all business innovation dimensions and remains consistent for SMEs with differing levels of financial performance, size, and operational maturity. Each component of AI Capital independently exhibits a positive association with business innovation outcomes. |
| Keywords: | artificial intelligence, artificial intelligence capital, business innovation, innovation, SMEs |
| JEL: | O31 O33 O32 L26 L25 M15 D83 J24 O14 O39 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18476 |
| By: | Alejandro Bello-Pintado (Universidad Pública de Navarra); Carlos Bianchi (Universidad de la República (Uruguay). Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y de Administración. Instituto de Economía); Sofía Maio (Universidad de la República (Uruguay). Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y de Administración. Instituto de Economía) |
| Abstract: | This study examines how innovation modes, STI (Science and Technology-based Innovation), DUI (Innovation based on learning-by-Doing, learning-by-Using, learning by-Interacting) and their combination, shape firms’ use of formal and informal intellectual property protection mechanisms (IPPM) and influence product innovation performance. Using panel data from the National Innovation Activities Survey (2010 2021) of Uruguay, results show that STI drives formal IPPM and enhances innovation likelihood and novelty, while DUI fosters informal IPPM with limited impact on innovation outcomes. However, combined STI-DUI strategies generate coordination tensions, constraining innovation performance |
| Keywords: | innovation modes, knowledge appropriability strategies, firm organization |
| JEL: | O31 O32 O54 |
| Date: | 2026–02 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ulr:wpaper:dt-02-26 |
| By: | Wantchekon, Leonard |
| Abstract: | Research and development (R&D) is a central driver of long-term economic growth, technological progress, and institutional capacity. Yet many African countries remain marginal in the global knowledge economy, with limited investment in science, technology, and innovation (STI) and weak research ecosystems. This paper argues that the persistence of Africa's innovation deficit is partly rooted in the design of foreign aid and development policies, which have historically prioritized short-term service delivery over long-term investments in scientific capacity and technological capability. Drawing on economic theory, empirical evidence, and comparative case studies, the paper examines the role of R&D in structural transformation and assesses the structural barriers that limit innovation in Africa, including chronic underfunding, short-term aid cycles, misalignment between donor priorities and national strategies, and weak institutional systems. Evidence from countries such as Ethiopia, Brazil, and China demonstrates how sustained investment in research institutions, human capital, and international knowledge partnerships can generate significant productivity gains and technological upgrading. The paper concludes that development cooperation must shift toward innovation-driven growth. Strengthening universities, financing basic sciences, and fostering university-industry-government collaboration are essential steps for enabling African countries to transition from technology consumers to producers in the global knowledge economy. |
| Keywords: | Foreign aid, development policy, knowledge economy, innovation |
| JEL: | F35 O30 O32 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:ifwkwp:339614 |
| By: | Qayoom Khachoo (Indian Institute of Foreign Trade); Ridwan Ah Sheikh (Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research); Pritam Banerjee (Indian Institute of Foreign Trade) |
| Abstract: | This study leverages India's Patents (Amendment) Act, 2002, as a quasi-natural experiment within a difference-in-differences framework to examine how domestic reforms related to patents may affect firms' export behavior and their integration to the global value chains. Exploiting a detailed firm-level database covering the universe of Indian manufacturing firms, we find that heightened patent protection is associated with approximately a 18 increase in exports and a 12 increase in total imports among high-tech firms relative to low-tech firms, even including firm, year, and industry-by-year fixed effects. We further show that stronger enforcement of intellectual property rights (IPRs) has a positive impact on firms' imports of intermediate inputs. Specifically, high-tech firms experienced 20 increase in raw-material imports relative to their low-tech counterparts. In contrast, the reform was associated with a significant reduction in imports of spares and stores. While the average treatment effects on capital and final goods imports remain insignificant, event-study estimates suggest positive and statistically significant effects, albeit with a delay. This study provides policy-relevant evidence that stronger IPRs in emerging market economies such as India enhance firms' trade performance by stimulating innovation, promoting technology transfer and adoption, and enabling access to advanced global inputs. |
| Keywords: | IPRs, Exports, Imports, Global value chains, Difference-in-Differences |
| JEL: | F13 F14 O30 O33 O34 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ind:igiwpp:2026-001 |
| By: | Emanuele Bazzichi; Massimo Riccaboni; Fulvio Castellacci |
| Abstract: | We study how artificial intelligence (AI) affects firms' incentives to pursue incremental versus radical knowledge recombinations. We develop a model of recombinant innovation embedded in a Schumpeterian quality-ladder framework, in which innovation arises from recombining ideas across varying distances in a knowledge space. R&D consists of multiple tasks, a fraction of which can be performed by AI. AI facilitates access to distant knowledge domains, but at the same time it also increases the aggregate rate of creative destruction, shortening the monopoly duration that rewards radical innovations. Moreover, excessive reliance on AI may reduce the originality of research and lead to duplication of research efforts. We obtain three main results. First, higher AI productivity encourages more distant recombinations, if the direct facilitation effect is stronger than the indirect effect due to intensified competition from rivals. Second, the effect of increasing the share of AI-automated R&D tasks is non-monotonic: firms initially target more radical innovations, but beyond a threshold of human-AI complementarity, they shift the focus toward incremental innovations. Third, in the limiting case of full automation, the model predicts that optimal recombination distance collapses to zero, suggesting that fully AI-driven research would undermine the very knowledge creation that it seeks to accelerate. |
| Date: | 2026–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2604.02189 |
| By: | Sizhong Sun |
| Abstract: | This paper studies firms' optimal response to a trade liberalization shock in terms of export and product innovation both theoretically and empirically. We find that trade liberalization, namely China's WTO accession, reduces trade cost and promotes export, which in turn incentivizes firms to innovate as the marginal benefit of innovation for exporting firms is higher than that for non-exporting firms. In addition, as a firm starts to innovate, it predicts to have a higher probability of moving to a better productivity state and can save the entry cost of innovation in the future, resulting in additional dynamic benefits. Such an innovation-promotion effect is an unintended consequence of trade liberalization. |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2603.23825 |
| By: | Balazs Egert |
| Abstract: | This paper reviews the contributions of the 2025 Nobel Prize in Economics laureates, Joel Mokyr, Philippe Aghion and Peter Howitt, to our understanding of innovation-driven economic growth, situating their work within the broader evolution of modern growth theory and empirical evidence. It highlights why the Industrial Revolution marked a transition to sustained, self-reinforcing technological progress and shows how Mokyr's emphasis on knowledge, culture and institutions complements Aghion and Howitt's Schumpeterian framework, which formalises innovation as a competitive process of firm entry, exit and technological replacement. The paper then uses these frameworks to interpret the widespread productivity slowdown observed in advanced OECD economies since the mid-2000s, arguing that weakened creative destruction, slower diffusion of frontier technologies, declining business dynamism and policy headwinds are key explanatory factors. |
| Keywords: | innovation, productivity, economic growth, creative destruction, institutions |
| JEL: | O30 O40 O43 L16 N10 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12572 |
| By: | Werner, Sven; Sievert, Maximiliane; Haney, Aoife Brophy; Trotter, Philipp |
| Abstract: | Start-ups are an important component of driving context-sensitive sustainable development in emerging markets based on domestic innovation. However, knowledge on how best to support the capabilities, networks and access to finance of such ventures is limited, specifically in emerging markets. In this paper, we leverage novel data from a pan-African start-up accelerator to understand whether and why accelerators are effective. Adopting an entrepreneurial ecosystem lens and conceptualizing accelerators as intermediaries within ecosystems, we test two competing views of accelerator effectiveness: substitution and complementarity. Our results provide support for a complementarity view, where the positive effects of accelerators are higher in more mature ecosystems. We contribute to the literature by drawing attention to the importance of the context within which accelerators are situated, challenging the predominant approach of substituting for missing ecosystem components in emerging markets. |
| Abstract: | Start-ups gelten als wichtiger Motor für eine kontextsensitive und nachhaltige Entwicklung in Ländern mit niedrigen und mittleren Einkommen, insbesondere wenn sie auf lokalen Innovationen beruht. Dennoch ist bislang nur begrenzt bekannt, wie sich die Fähigkeiten, Netzwerke und der Zugang zu Finanzmitteln dieser Unternehmen effektiv fördern lassen - insbesondere im Kontext von Ländern mit niedrigen und mittleren Einkommen. In diesem Beitrag nutzen wir neuartige Daten eines panafrikanischen Start-up-Accelerators, um zu untersuchen, ob und warum Accelerator-Programme wirksam sind. Aufbauend auf der Perspektive unternehmerischer Ökosysteme und der Konzeption von Accelerators als Intermediäre innerhalb dieser Ökosysteme testen wir zwei konkurrierende Erklärungsansätze für ihre Wirksamkeit: Substitution und Komplementarität. Unsere Ergebnisse stützen die Komplementaritätsperspektive, wonach die positiven Effekte von Accelerators in reiferen Ökosystemen stärker ausgeprägt sind. Damit leisten wir einen Beitrag zur Literatur, indem wir die Bedeutung des institutionellen und ökosystemischen Kontexts, in den Accelerators eingebettet sind, hervorheben. Wir hinterfragen den verbreiteten Ansatz, fehlende Ökosystemkomponenten in Schwellenländern durch isolierte Fördermaßnahmen ersetzen zu wollen. |
| Keywords: | Accelerator, start-up, entrepreneurial ecosystem, entrepreneurship support, impact assessment |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:rwirep:339617 |
| By: | Zaggl, Michael A.; Steininger, Dennis M.; Isaak, Andrew J. |
| Abstract: | Performance feedback mechanisms play a pivotal role in motivating users’ voluntary contributions, which are crucial to sustaining online knowledge communities. We use motivation theory and conceptually distinguish reputation and status. Specifically, we hypothesize that reputation motivates contributions when users are of low status, but that achieved status will have a demotivating effect. We test our hypotheses by examining status and reputation mechanisms in a large knowledge exchange community (Stack Overflow). Consistent with our hypotheses, we find robust evidence that reputation-related performance feedback mechanisms are positively related to contribution behavior, whereas status-related mechanisms deplete motivation. Therefore, higher status crowds out the motivational effect of reputation-seeking. This study extends the literature on motivation in knowledge exchange communities by highlighting the difference between status and reputation as two opposing forces. Thereby, we also offer an explanation for the often-observed pattern of declining user contributions in online knowledge exchange communities. |
| Keywords: | Knowledge Exchange, Crowdsourcing, Motivation, Status, Reputation, Panel Regression |
| JEL: | D83 M15 D91 J24 L86 D23 O33 M50 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:esconf:338887 |
| By: | Faiza Elloumi (FSEG Sfax - Faculté des Sciences Economiques et de Gestion de Sfax - جامعة صفاقس - Université de Sfax - University of Sfax, جامعة صفاقس - Université de Sfax - University of Sfax) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates how artificial intelligence (AI) can accelerate the transition toward a circular economy by optimizing resource use, enhancing supply chain transparency, and promoting innovative, sustainable business models. Through concrete applications such as intelligent waste sorting and reverse logistics, AI contributes to reducing losses, improving traceability, and supporting innovative circular practices. A survey conducted with 65 Tunisian SMEs confirms that, when adoption is supported by organizational and institutional factors, AI improves environmental performance and helps achieve sustainable development goals. |
| Keywords: | Artificial intelligence, Circular economy, Reverse logistics, Resource optimization, Traceability |
| Date: | 2025–12–17 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05557018 |