|
on Small Business Management |
|
Issue of 2011‒12‒19
sixteen papers chosen by Joao Carlos Correia Leitao University of Beira Interior and Technical University of Lisbon |
| By: | A. Lasagni |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the role of external relationships as key drivers of small business innovation. An empirical analysis is based on data for approximately 500 small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in six European countries. The results indicate that innovation performance is higher in SMEs that are proactive in strengthening their relationships with innovative suppliers, users and customers. Furthermore, the findings of this paper support the view that SMEs will have better new product development results if they improve their relationships with laboratories and research institutes. |
| Keywords: | : SMEs, open innovation, networks, external relationships |
| JEL: | L60 O31 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:par:dipeco:2011-ep04&r=sbm |
| By: | Christian Le Bas (GATE Lyon Saint-Etienne - Groupe d'analyse et de théorie économique - CNRS : UMR5824 - Université Lumière - Lyon II - École Normale Supérieure de Lyon); Caroline Mothe (IREGE - Institut de Recherche en Gestion et en Economie - Université de Savoie); Thuc Uyen Nguyen-Thi (CEPS/INSTEAD - Centre d'Etudes de Populations, de Pauvreté et de Politiques Socio-Economiques / International Networks for Studies in Technology, Environment, Alternatives, Development - Centre d'Etudes de Populations, de Pauvreté et de Politiques Socio-Economiques / International Networks for Studies in Technology, Environment, Alternatives, Development) |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we will review the literature on technological innovation persistence and provide a general theoretical framework to analyze the main determinants of this innovative behavior. Moreover, no previous empirical study has taken into account organizational innovation practices as possible determinants of innovation persistence. We will therefore include them, as previous studies have shown the interaction effects between the two types of innovation, and produce empirical results on technical innovation persistence. A multinomial probit model was used to estimate the likelihood of belonging to each of the three longitudinal innovation profiles. Results confirm the differentiated impact of determinants on process and technological innovation persistence, and the effect of R&D intensity, R&D cooperation and competition intensity. As hypothesized, we also found that organizational innovation is a determinant factor for innovation persistence and, more generally speaking, for technological innovation, in particular organizational practices such as knowledge management and external partnerships. |
| Keywords: | Persistence; Innovation; Technological innovation; Organizational innovation; R&D |
| Date: | 2011–12–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-00649095&r=sbm |
| By: | Diego Aboal; Paula Garda; Bibiana Lanzilotta; Marcelo Perera |
| Abstract: | The employment impact of innovation in the heterogeneous universe of services was studied using data from the 2004-2009 Uruguayan service innovation surveys. The empirical evidence shows that the impact of product innovation on employment is positive, while process innovation appears to have no effect. The effect varies according to the skill level of the labor force, across sectors, and the type of innovation strategy pursued by firms. Process innovation activities tend to substitute low-skilled jobs with higher-skilled jobs, while product innovation allows for more gains in efficiency in the production of new products with unskilled labor and no gains with the skilled labor force. Producing technology in-house has in most cases no impact on employment, while the combined strategy of acquiring technology outside the firm and producing it in-house has strong positive effects. The results found for knowledge-intensive business services and small firms, with some exceptions, are similar to the ones found for whole sample. |
| Keywords: | Science & Technology :: Research & Development, Science & Technology :: New Technologies, Labor :: Workforce & Employment, Economics :: Economic Development & Growth, service sector, innovation, innovation strategies, firm size, knowledge intensity, employment quantity and quality, innovation surveys, Uruguay |
| JEL: | D2 J23 L8 O31 O33 |
| Date: | 2011–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:idb:brikps:60318&r=sbm |
| By: | Federico Barbiellini Amidei (Bank of Italy); John Cantwell (Rutgers University); Anna Spadavecchia (University of Reading) |
| Abstract: | The paper explores the long run evolution of Italy’s performance in technological innovation as a function of international technology transfer, reconstructing the different phases and dimensions of Italian innovative activity, tracking the transfer of foreign technological knowledge through a number of channels, analysing the impact of imported technology. The study is based on a newly constructed dataset, over the 1861-2009 period, composed of variables related to: innovation activity performance; foreign technology transfer; domestic absorptive and innovative capability. The analysis highlights, also by econometric assessment, the significant contribution of foreign technology both to innovation activity results and to productivity growth. Differences across channels of technology transfer and historical phases emerge, also in connection with the evolution of human capital endowment and domestic innovative capacity. Machinery imports contributed positively both to innovation activity and to productivity growth; inward FDI contributed positively to productivity growth, but not to indigenous innovation activity; the accumulation of technical human capital fuelled both. In the long Italian Golden Age, for the first time the association of foreign technological knowledge with indigenous innovation processes strengthened productivity significantly. More recently instead the dismal productivity growth is negatively associated with formalised innovation activity under-performance and reduced imports of disembodied technology |
| Keywords: | Italy,Technology Transfer,Innovation,Absorptive Capability,Patenting |
| JEL: | N10 O31 O33 F23 O19 |
| Date: | 2011–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdi:workqs:qse_7&r=sbm |
| By: | De Fuentes, Claudia (CIRCLE, Lund University); Dutrénit, Gabriela (Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco) |
| Abstract: | The aim of this paper is to analyze the relationship between large firms´ knowledge spillovers and small and medium enterprises absorptive capacities. We build ad-hoc indicators for these two concepts following a factor analysis methodology, and we carry out a structural equations analysis to determine the relationship between them. Based on firm level original data from a survey that focuses on SMEs in a Mexican locality, this paper argues that in a low-tech and mature sector, such as the machine shop sector, that operates in a loosely articulated local system, two knowledge spillover mechanisms are relevant: the backward linkages and the employees´ mobility. Regarding SMEs’ absorptive capacities they are strongly influenced by organizational capabilities and innovation and learning activities. We also argue that large firms’ knowledge spillovers are strongly correlated to SMEs absorptive capacities within the sector and locality analyzed.<p> |
| Keywords: | Absorptive capacities; Knowledge spillovers; SME-large firms interaction; Mexico |
| JEL: | O30 |
| Date: | 2011–01–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:lucirc:2011_001&r=sbm |
| By: | Masatoshi Kato (School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University); Hiroyuki Okamuro (Graduate School of Economics, Hitotsubashi University); Yuji Honjo (Faculty of Commerce, Chuo University) |
| Abstract: | Using a sample from an original questionnaire survey in Japan, this paper explores whether and how founders’ human capital affects innovation outcomes by start-ups. The results provide evidence that founders with greater human capital are more likely to yield innovation outcome. However, because certain types of founders’ human capital may boost R&D investment, which possibly results in innovation outcomes, we estimate the determinants of innovation outcomes by an instrumental variable probit model taking into account the endogeneity of R&D investment. Our findings suggest that specific human capital for innovation, such as founders’ prior innovation experience, is directly associated with innovation outcomes after start-up, while generic human capital, such as founders’ educational background, indirectly affects innovation outcomes through R&D investment. |
| Keywords: | Founder, Human capital, Innovations, R&D investment |
| JEL: | L24 M13 O31 |
| Date: | 2011–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kgu:wpaper:78&r=sbm |
| By: | Isaksen, Arne (Dept of working life and innovation); Nilsson, Magnus (CIRCLE, Lund University) |
| Abstract: | New research indicates that firms combining the science-based STI (Science, Technology, Innovation) and the experience-based DUI (Doing, Using, Interacting) modes of innovation are more efficient when it comes to improving innovation capacity and competitiveness. With regard to innovation policy, the STI mode calls for a supply driven policy, typically aimed to commercialise research results. The DUI mode suggests a demand driven policy approach, such as supporting the development of new products or services to specific markets. This paper analyses how the two types of innovation policy and the two innovation modes can be combined in regional innovation systems. The analysis builds on studies of the food industry and related knowledge organisations in two counties, Rogaland County (Norway) and Skåne County (Sweden), and two policy initiatives (NCE Culinology and Skåne Food Innovation Network) aimed at strengthening the innovative capability of the regional innovation systems. The analysis indicates that policies aimed to link science and user driven innovation activity should focus on building absorptive capacity of DUI firms (e.g. through increased scientific competence) and implementation capacity of STI firms (e.g. through increased market and process competence). |
| Keywords: | innovation policy; scientific knowledge; practical knowledge; regional innovation systems; food industry; Norway; Sweden |
| JEL: | O33 O38 |
| Date: | 2011–12–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:lucirc:2011_012&r=sbm |
| By: | Franco Amatori (Università Commerciale "Luigi Bocconi", Milan); Matteo Bugamelli (Bank of Italy); Andrea Colli (Università Commerciale "Luigi Bocconi", Milan) |
| Abstract: | The economic performance of a country depends, among other things, on the strategies and structures of its firms. In the framework that is designed by institutions and policies and determined by technology and macroeconomic cycles, entrepreneurs decide how to allocate available resources in order to face off competitors and to hook up with demand cycles. This paper looks at the evolution of the Italian economy across the last 150 years from a business history perspective. Analyzing Italian firms over the long-term cycles of the global economy and with respect to the different paradigms of the three industrial revolutions, we identify some structural features that explain successes and failures of the Italian economy. In doing this we explicitly connect the micro level of the business enterprise to the macro one of the national business system and explain the comparatively good performance of the Italian economy from the end of the 19th century to the 1970s. Over the last three decades this performance has turned negative, highlighting the role played by the small average size of firms and the failure of institutions to provide incentives for growth. |
| Keywords: | firm size, technological paradigms, innovation, entrepreneurship |
| JEL: | N83 N84 P12 O33 O38 |
| Date: | 2011–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdi:workqs:qse_13&r=sbm |
| By: | Juan Gallego; Luis H. Gutiérrez; Sang H. Lee |
| Abstract: | This study examines ICT adoption among 3,759 Colombian manufacturing firms, and attempts to identify the factors that are conducive to the adoption and usage of ICT at the firm level. Our major findings are (i) that the adoption of a given information and communication technology is better facilitated when a firm is relatively large, has large human capital, engages in more innovative activities, and when a firm’s organizational structure is better aligned with the given technology; (ii) that positive associations between the key determinants and ICT adoptions are more pronounced for small and medium-sized firms than for large ones, and (iii) that information spillovers within industries is also a determinant of ICT adoptions by the firms. |
| Date: | 2011–12–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:col:000092:009155&r=sbm |
| By: | Ben Youssef, Slim; Breton, Michèle; Zaccour, Georges |
| Abstract: | We consider a duopoly competing in quantity, where firms can invest in both innovative and absorptive R&D to reduce their unit production cost, and where they benefit from free R&D spillovers between them. We analyze the case where firms act non cooperatively and the case where they cooperate by forming a research joint venture. We show that, in both modes of play, there exists a unique symmetric solution. We find that the investment in innovative R&D is always higher than in absorptive R&D. We also find that the value of the learning parameter has almost no impact on innovative R&D, firms profits, consumer's surplus and social welfare. Finally, differences in investment in absorptive research and social welfare under the two regimes are in opposite directions according to the importance of the free spillover. |
| Keywords: | Innovative R&D; Absorptive R&D; Learning Parameter; Spillover; Research Joint Venture |
| JEL: | C7 C61 O32 |
| Date: | 2011–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:35326&r=sbm |
| By: | Christin, Clémence |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we highlight new conditions under which R&D agreements may have anti-competitive effects. We focus on cases where two firms compete with each other and with a competitive fringe. R&D activities need a specific input available to all firms on a common market, the price of which increases with demand for the input. In such a context, if a firm increases its R&D expenses, it increases the cost of R&D for its rivals. This induces exit from the fringe and may increase the final price. Therefore, by contrast to the case where the cost of R&D for one firm is independent of its rivals' R&D decisions, cooperation between strategic firms on the upstream market may induce more R&D by strategic firms, in order to exclude firms from the fringe and increase the final price. -- |
| Keywords: | Competition policy,Research and Development Agreements,Collusion,Entry deterrence |
| JEL: | L13 L24 L41 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:dicedp:38&r=sbm |
| By: | Giuseppe Berta (Università Commerciale "Luigi Bocconi", Milan); Fabrizio Onida (Università Commerciale "Luigi Bocconi", Milan) |
| Abstract: | After a quick profile of Italian foreign direct investments since 1900 and a short review of the main explanations of the lagged multinational growth by Italian manufacturing companies, a quick glimpse of business histories is given to the only two still today living “old protagonists” (Pirelli, Fiat) and to three old corporate groups (Olivetti, SNIA Viscosa, Montecatini-Montedison) who had also reached a significant degree of full internationalization early in the XX century, but during the second postwar period underwent profound dismantling of their original business mission. Finally the paper focuses on few cases of “new protagonists”, mid-size family companies who undertook a true multinational strategy only in the most recent decades and today represent the core of the Italian “fourth capitalism”. |
| Keywords: | Italian industry-multinational companies |
| JEL: | F23 L60 N63 N64 N83 N84 |
| Date: | 2011–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdi:workqs:qse_15&r=sbm |
| By: | Juana Kuramoto |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes quantitative findings on the innovative behavior of firms in the production chains of pisco and shoe manufacture in Peru, which are served by the network of Technological Innovation Centers (CITEs), the most important technology policy instrument available in Peru. These two chains, in low and medium-technology industries, are representative of Peru’s manufacturing sector. Of particular interest is the role of technical standards as a means of technological diffusion, which is stressed in the work of the CITEs. For the pisco chain, that role involves the definition of the product itself, for which Peru is seeking a World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) denomination. In the shoe chain, the technical standard should act as a coordination mechanism that will help increase efficiency throughout the chain, which at present is often fractured. |
| JEL: | O14 O25 O33 |
| Date: | 2011–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:idb:wpaper:4741&r=sbm |
| By: | Ricardo Monge-Gonzalez |
| Abstract: | This paper uses a randomized controlled experiment in Costa Rica to determine whether IB use by Banco Nacional de Desarrollo`s micro and small enterprise (MSE) clients has an impact on their performance, measured in terms of productivity, increase in sales, and cost reduction. Results from the intervention group surveys indicate that Internet use is limited in MSEs` daily operations because of limited access to computers and the relatively low penetration of Internet services in employees` activities. In addition, firms have limited knowledge about the uses of the Internet as a business development tool. These results contrast with the reported benefits obtained by a small group of firms. Those benefits include reduced costs, higher sales, and better contact with customers. |
| JEL: | D22 D83 O14 O38 |
| Date: | 2011–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:idb:wpaper:4742&r=sbm |
| By: | Kimle, Kevin; Yu, Li; Orazem, Peter; Jolly, Robert W. |
| Abstract: | This report presents an overview of social entrepreneurship activities of public university graduates obtained from a survey. Almost 3 percent of respondents had created at least one nonprofit organization. The primary focus of the organizations founded by social entrepreneur respondents was education and youth related causes, with services geared heavily toward local needs. The nonprofit organizations founded to meet these needs were typically small, with one or two paid employees and 5 to 15 volunteers. |
| Keywords: | social entrepreneurship; non-profit enterprises; alumni |
| Date: | 2011–12–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:isu:genres:34666&r=sbm |
| By: | Nadine Levratto; Luc Tessier; Messaoud Zouikri |
| Abstract: | This empirical paper investigates the path to bankruptcy for a sample of French firms in default, in particular the decision to file a petition for bankruptcy, the arbitrage between rescuing and liquidation and the effective survival. The procedure is depicted as a sequence of three steps in which judges play a crucial role as they decide whether a company is insolvent or not and determine whether an insolvent company deserves to be rescued or, on the contrary, should be liquidated, the market having the last word since the effective success depends on the capability of the firm to recover from the judicial proceedings. We test different hypotheses about the variables influencing each possibility which include i) the role of the market in the firm's health, ii) the influence of financial structures, iii) the importance of corporate governance and iv) the inherent corporate factors of probable survival. Using three linked LOGIT models, our first finding is that the probability to default depends mainly on the market. Secondly the probability to be rescued depends essentially on the financial structure. Finally, the probability for the firm to remain in business in the long term is largely influenced by the market and profitability. Our results also support the idea that governance, size and resources are the main determinants of exit from the market or success of any company. |
| Keywords: | Insolvency, bankruptcy, firm default, financial indicators, size, logit models. |
| JEL: | D20 G32 G33 K20 |
| Date: | 2011 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:drm:wpaper:2011-36&r=sbm |