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This paper investigated the influence of subcontracting on innovation and its impact on the performance of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Onitsha, Nigeria. The paper adopted a number of methods comprising of field observations, reference to relevant literature, and a questionnaire survey of 113 SMEs. Regression, mean and standard deviation were used to analyse the data. In line with the literature, this paper identified seven (7) dimensions of subcontracting assistance from large scale industries to small business firms. The paper found that subcontracting relationship between large scale industries and SMEs is inclined to production and product-related cooperation where the contractors are concerned with meeting fluctuation in demand and shortening long delivery times. This paper concluded by suggesting that subcontracting relationship between SMEs and large scale industries should not be restricted to production, purchase, finance and marketing assistance. It should also be extended to human resource development and organisational-know-how. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the determinants of innovation behavior in European firms that are predominantly small and medium in size. The aim is to assess the absolute as well as the relative impact on innovation behavior of firm-specific (i.e., internal) factors on the one hand and region-specific characteristics on the other. Two hypotheses are advanced and tested. The first is that—contrary in part to some recent literature on regional and national innovation systems—firm-specific determinants of innovation are more important than either region-specific or external factors. The second hypothesis is that in high-tech regions dominated by a small number of very large firms the innovation behavior of the smaller firms is more strongly influenced by regional factors than by factors internal to the firm. Whereas the first hypothesis is confirmed by the empirical results presented here, the second is not. Because firm-level innovation determinants are of great importance in the European regions investigated in this study, we suggest that local innovation policy should focus more on the specific needs of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in particular regions than on improving regional conditions for innovation in general. The analysis is mainly based on data from the European Regional Innovation Survey (ERIS) and includes information from more than 8,000 interviews with manufacturing firms, service firms, and research institutions in 11 European regions. The logit analyses reported in this paper used data from some 1,800 manufacturing firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that a cartel is not necessarily synonymous with a brake on innovation but that, on the contrary, it may become the site of information transfer and technology exchange. The example chosen is the cable industry. Research was based on the archives of two Swiss cable manufacturers and on those of a Swiss and an international cartel (International Cable Development Corporation) from the beginning of the twentieth century until the 1970s. The cartels studied, which were primarily based on territorial and price protection, fostered various forms of information and technology transfers: exchange of information in order to rationalise production, know-how sharing, transfers or sales of patents or licences, standardisation of products to ensure compatibility between products from various companies. Finally, one of the cartels studied became a key player in Research and Development (R&D) by creating test structures and R&D laboratories and controlling market introduction of innovating products. The historiography of the last 30 years had a tendency to consider cartels as an exception, however, as Jeffrey Fear wrote 'Yet, until the 1980s, the global story of big business must be told in conjunction with cartels rather than without them' (Fear, October 2006). The purpose of this paper is to once again look at one aspect of the cartels' impact on the innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Knowledge-intensive services are seen to have an increased importance for learning and innovation activity in a more knowledge-based economy. This paper compares the relevance of two complementary approaches as analytical tools in studying the exchange of knowledge-intensive services in innovation processes. The first approach focuses on the importance of expert knowledge from companies in the KIBS (knowledge-intensive business services) sector as input in innovation processes. The other approach focuses on the role of knowledge-intensive service activities (KISA) in innovation processes. The latter approach regards a wider set of players as potentially important knowledge-intensive service providers than just KIBS firms, it focuses on knowledge exchange beyond market relations, and it emphasizes the mix and match of internal and external knowledge-intensive services. This paper analyses the relevance of the two approaches by studying the use of knowledge-intensive services in two Norwegian industries dominated by different knowledge bases, that is, the aquaculture and the software industry, respectively. Empirical studies in the two industries demonstrate that the KISA approach certainly brings new elements into the investigation of the role of knowledge-intensive services in innovation activity. The approach focuses on how knowledge exchange occurs (in static or dynamic ways), and how it relates to firms' own innovation processes. However, innovation studies can also benefit from differentiating more between different types of firms, for example, firms in different phases of their life cycle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We analyze how intra-group culture diversity affect group affiliated firm's innovation. Our findings suggest that the more inconsistency on risk preference among affiliated firms in one group, the less impact of affiliated firm's own risk culture on innovation. Specifically, we document that intra-group culture diversity impedes individual affiliated firm's innovation through managerial and controlling agency problems. The heterogeneity test shows that size, executives, headquarter connected, location, state ownership and information quality of affiliated firms can affect intra-group culture diversity on innovation. We prove that intra-group culture diversity impedes innovation on group affiliated firms, which means a dark side of business group affiliation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information--Communications Technologies (ICTs) are no longer just for internal use. Rather, in the era of open and distributed innovation, they must be leveraged by businesses and organizations to reach, record and review ideas from internal and external sources ranging from vendors, suppliers and customers to employees. ICTs enable the entire innovation process, from idea generation and development to experimenting and testing, and, finally, to commercialization of ideas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Impelled by a crisis in Dutch horticulture in the early 1930s, two Dutch food preserving companies, Hero and De Betuwe, decided to start producing non-alcoholic drinks made from fruits and vegetables. Different kinds of knowledge were needed for this radical innovation. Innovation trajectories were established and knowledge was incorporated, but the knowledge sources and 'knowledge filters' of the two companies were very different. Hero's Swiss parent played an important role in transferring Swiss knowledge of production techniques to its Dutch subsidiary company. De Betuwe, on the other hand, mainly relied on knowledge provided by the existing Dutch horticultural innovation network. While succeeding in the soft drink market was to a certain degree a competition between publicly available knowledge and private knowledge, in the end both companies succeeded in producing a comparable product, but their routes to success were different. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]