The Role of Knowledge in Enhancing SME Innovation: The Case of Knowsley – Northwest Region of England.

This study examines the knowledge of entrepreneurs on the complex concept of innovation before assessing how they apply this knowledge to increase the propensity to develop new products and services. Within this context, considerable emphasis explores the assertions that knowledge management can enhance the adoption of new technology through collaborative networks. The aim of the study is to build a body of work in the area of innovation and entrepreneurship that spans the divide between theory and practice by empirically harnessing the perspectives of the case study companies on their innovation behavior. The design of this study adopts the characteristics of a case study research which was applied extensively to provide qualitative data. To be included in the study, firms had to be in existence for at least a year, and firms of the same age were avoided. The findings revealed that the concept of innovation is heterogeneous and elusive. Therefore, the study concluded that innovation is a global concept that requires knowledge acquisition through collaborative networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]