Anchor,incumbent and late entry MNEs as propellents of technology cluster evolution

This paper reports on a longitudinal qualitative study on the role of MNEs (multinational enterprises), as conduits of knowledge flows, in the evolution of a technology cluster. Previous studies illustrated how MNEs were attracted to existent clusters and their modes of entry into the cluster. This study however sets out not only how MNEs originated this cluster, but also how incumbent and later entrant MNEs propelled the cluster onwards in related and unrelated technology branches through both shaping knowledge density in the cluster and spreading knowledge breadth across the cluster. This facilitated simultaneous cluster specialisation, diversification and connectivity into the global system, thereby reducing vulnerability to technological disruption.     

Innovation and international business

Abstract

While classical economic theories of growth emphasised international capital accumulation, and finance-based theories of foreign investment stressed international interest rate differentials and risk reduction, the technological accumulation approach examines international knowledge building by multinational enterprises and their international business (IB) networks. The two processes of innovation and internationalisation have become ever more interconnected as central drivers of development since the first industrial revolution, through to today’s information age. The increasing significance of the knowledge-seeking motive for IB networks and of competence-creating subsidiary activities at a local level have linked localised innovation systems to IB and to international knowledge exchange. From a locational perspective, international knowledge connectivity has become critical for sustained innovation and growth. The shift of techno-socio-economic paradigm in the information age is associated with a shift in the character of IB and innovation, with critical implications for IB theory and concepts.     

Universities and Innovation in Space

We investigate the role of universities as a knowledge source for regional innovation processes. The contribution of universities is tested on the level of German NUTS-3 regions (Kreise) by using a variety of indicators. We find that the intensity and quality of the research conducted by the universities have a significant effect on regional innovative output while pure size is unimportant. Therefore, a policy that wants to promote regional innovation processes by building up universities should place substantial emphasis on the intensity and quality of the research conducted there. We also find the effects of universities to be concentrated in space. Obviously, the geographical proximity to particular knowledge sources is important for regional innovative activities.     

Innovation Performance and International Knowledge Spillovers: Evidence from the Renewable Energy Sector in OECD Countries

This paper aims at evaluating the sources of differences among countries' innovative performances in the renewable energy (RE) sector. Namely, we focus on the national innovative capacity, the knowledge developed abroad and the related knowledge spillovers. We claim that a country is more likely to develop RE innovation: (i) the larger the knowledge stocks of other countries in the same sector; (ii) especially when those other countries share established linkages with the focal country. Relying on a knowledge production function, we model country-level innovative performances in the RE sector for 18 OECD countries in the period 1990–2006. Our findings confirm that, once controlling for climate-energy policies, international knowledge spillovers contribute significantly to RE innovation, and their effect is comparable with domestic R&D and human capital. In addition, international spillovers are more likely if countries share stronger linkages.     

制造企业的产品创新与知识管理

分析了制造企业所面临的变革与挑战，探讨了“知识”在产品创新过程中作为一种独特而又无限的资源必须进行有效的管理和充分利用的观点，认为知识已经成为产品创新和帮助客户创造价值的源泉，传统制造企业能否向知识型制造企业过渡，在很大程度上取决于在其业务过程中是否能有效地获取和应用知识。在构建了知识型制造企业总体构架的基础上，根据知识管理的目标、构架特征和系统结构，研究了知识型企业的知识共享空间基础的建立。通过案例分析了建立知识管理系统的主要过程及其应用。     

External Knowledge and Innovation Performance in Clusters: Empirical Evidence from the Uruguay Software Cluster

The importance of geographic proximity for innovation has been widely stressed in the cluster literature. Yet, new insights from the inter-organisational network and cluster literatures underline the role of non-local linkages in enabling firms in networks to enhance learning and to innovate. This paper contributes to this literature by examining the importance of local and non-local knowledge networks for the innovation performance of firms in clusters. Our analysis is based on primary data from a survey of 95 software firms clustered in Montevideo, Uruguay. The results highlight that the most innovative firms in clusters heavily rely on non-local knowledge networks. Moreover, the number of indirect local ties to other firms is a better predictor of innovative performance than the number of direct local ties. Finally, our findings confirm the presence of knowledge gatekeepers in clusters and emphasise their role in enhancing innovation in clusters by absorbing knowledge from extra-cluster sources and diffusing it to other local firms.     

面向产品的高技术企业集群协同创新系统集成

为了提高集群创新能力和提升集群在全球产业链中的竞争力,运用系统协同思想来分析集群创新实现问题。构建了基于集群产品创新有序集成的集群知识互动价值创造网络系统,及系统创新集成实现的模块化运作模式。实现了企业集群发展所需创新要素的统一,提高了要素间互动的效率,加快创新的进程与步伐,有效解决了集群创新面临的困境。     

虚拟企业中的知识扩散与技术创新

采用知识链方法对虚拟企业的技术和知识扩散与创新的方式和途径进行了初步探索，将虚拟企业中知识扩散方式分为传播扩散型、培养指导型和互动创造型三类模式；同时，认为信任机制是实现虚拟企业中成员企业知识特别是隐形知识的交流与共享的前提，是实现技术和知识创新的基础。     

Comparing a Pharmaceutical and an Agro-food Bioregion: On the Importance of Knowledge Bases for Socio-spatial Patterns of Innovation

The aim of this paper is to compare the socio-spatial patterns of innovation and knowledge linkages of a biopharmaceutical and an agro-food biotech cluster. Dissimilarities can be expected based on differences in terms of historical technological regimes and sectoral innovation system dynamics between the agro-food and pharmaceutical industries in general and particularly the distinctive analytical (science-based) knowledge base of biopharmaceuticals in contrast with the more synthetic (engineering-based) knowledge base of agro-food biotechnology. Drawing on bibliometric data and case material the study compares two representative bioregions: a biopharmaceutical cluster in Scania, Sweden and an agro-food biotech cluster in Saskatoon, Canada. The empirical study supports the theoretical expectations and shows that knowledge dynamics in the agro-food cluster are more localized than in the biopharmaceuticals cluster. It is important, however, to acknowledge that these differences are relative. Both sectors display local and non-local patterns of collaboration following the general pattern for biotechnology.     

Cluster-Based Technology Policy—The German Experience

The German Federal Government has undertaken a series of particularly interesting policy experiments in the field of technology policy in recent years, a major policy innovation being the explicit recognition of regional clustering aspects in federal support programmes. The paper provides a categorization and assessment of these policy experiments and tries to shed some new light on two fundamental policy questions that are important beyond the German context: (i) can clusters be built by national government policy action? and (ii) is regionalization of technology policy a suitable means of achieving goals at the national level? We find that utilizing the regional level to boost national innovation and competitiveness can—under certain conditions explicated in the paper—indeed be seen as a promising means of achieving national goals. More specifically, we find that InnoRegio type programmes might be particularly useful in regions with distinctive structural problems such as the Central and Eastern European countries, whereas BioRegio type models might be a suitable means of policy‐making at the level of the European Union.     

The Economies and Diseconomies of Industrial Clustering: Multinational Enterprises versus Uninational Enterprises

This study’s objective is to compare cluster economies and diseconomies for multinational enterprises (MNEs) and uninational enterprises (UNEs) within the London financial services cluster. In contrast to the implicit assumption of the cluster participation literature that the economies and diseconomies of clusters are valued similarly by all firms, we find that economies relating to social capital and labour market pooling are equally important to MNEs and UNEs, economies relating to local competition and diseconomies relating to congestion costs are more important to MNEs than to UNEs, and economies relating to the reputational effects of locating in a world-leading cluster and access to specialised suppliers are more important to UNEs than to MNEs. That MNEs and UNEs do not experience cluster economies and diseconomies in the same way indicates that both cluster participation theory and international business theory need augmentation to recognise that cluster incumbents benefit and suffer from cluster membership differently.     

技术创新及创新的管理

技术创新及其管理已经发展成为系统科学。创新不仅是个人创造能力的体现,而且是企业的一种核心竞争能力。文章首先探讨技术创新的定义、特征和类型,提出技术创新包括产品、过程、管理和市场4个内容,继而从知识获取和管理等若干方面讨论了企业如何才能成为技术创新的主体。然后对创新的实施、激励机制、评价体系和影响创新成功及失败的因素作了详尽的阐述。     

Industrial Knowledge Bases as Drivers of Open Innovation?

The article presents an analysis of a large-scale survey with the aim of understanding differences in the open, interactive and distributed nature of external innovation relations amongst firms belonging to different industrial knowledge bases. The thesis is that the source of critical innovation relevant knowledge differs between industrial knowledge bases, making the character and the need of openness contingent on these specificities. Accordingly, we anticipate that we will observe systematic variations in how industries access and combine innovation-related external knowledge. In our analyses we attempt to address a gap in the literature by examining how industrial knowledge bases affect the recombination of knowledge by analysing the different extents, forms (formal and informal) and geography of inbound open innovation. The article illustrates that features and structures of inbound open innovation align, to a large extent, with the industries' knowledge bases and that there is a interplay between an industry's knowledge base, the internal organisation of innovation processes and the channels and geography of inbound open innovation.     

Influences of Technical Innovation Mode on Innovation Strategy of Energy Enterprises

Technical innovation is the core for enterprise competence and sustaining. Technical innovation strategy is the policy which the enterprise carries out for technology innovation in a long term. The paper took the practice of the technology innovation strategy in PetroChina Chang- qing Oilfield Company as a case study, and illustrated the significance, function and features of the self-developed technology innovation, cooperation development technology innovation and introduction-innovation based on the strategy structure of the energy enterprises. The suggestions for technology innovation strategy structure for large energy enterprise were proposed in the paper.     

基于知识协同的联盟企业创新绩效系统动力学模型构建与分析

为了了解知识协同与联盟企业创新绩效的因果关系,设计并构建基于知识协同下的联盟企业创新绩效系统动力学模型进行分析。结果表明,所构建的系统动力学模型有效,仿真结果能够较好地模拟基于知识协同的联盟企业创新绩效的实际状况;对于联盟企业而言,知识协同对其创新绩效具有良好的促进作用;其中,知识协同的3因素,即知识活动协同、知识互惠协同及交流研习均对增加联盟企业创新绩效具有重要的推动作用;但由于受内外部多因素影响,知识协同对联盟企业创新绩效的作用不能立刻显现,随着联盟时间的延长,企业创新绩效的提升速度呈现逐渐上升趋势。     

知识发现——创新的源泉与保障

文章在简述了创新的基本概念及其重大意义与作用后，从知识在创新中的地位作用和获取应用的角度，把知识分为显性知识与隐性知识两大类，进而，把隐性知识划分为主观隐性知识、客观隐性知识和主客观交叉的隐性知识等三种，并分别进行了论述。从实现创新的过程及其对知识的需求，论证了知识发现是创新的源泉与保障，针对三种不同的隐性知识积压自的特质，阐述了知识挖掘、知识显化和知识提炼等三种相应的知识发现的概念，特征及其研究的现状与趋势。     

钢铁企业技术创新研究

为探讨我国钢铁企业应如何进行技术创新,介绍了我国钢铁企业当前相对落后的发展状况,并结合技术创新原理方法,制定了我国钢铁企业的技术创新战略,在此基础上以韩国浦项钢铁公司技术创新的成果为案例,指出技术创新是我国钢铁企业发展的必经之路.     

Innovation in Industrial Districts: Evidence from Italy

The aim of this paper is to show that Italian manufacturing firms belonging to Marshallian industrial districts carry out a higher innovative effort than is usually acknowledged. The empirical analysis makes use of a panel of 1,218 district and non-district firms belonging to traditional sectors. Data refers to the years 1992 and 1995. We have estimated an augmented Cobb-Douglas production function. The estimates make it possible to empirically identify three different determinants of firms' productivity: (i) the intentional innovative activity; (ii) the “district effect”; and (iii) the joint district and innovation effect. The results show that firms' membership in industrial districts and product innovations are key factors in explaining the productivity of firms working in traditional Italian sectors.     

面向产品创新知识集成的模型及机制

构建了知识过程与产品创新过程相融合的知识集成模型,具体从知识活动、知识内容和知识主体的角度分析了知识集成的MSSI、SCEI和ITOI模型,分析了该模型的特点;讨论了产品创新知识集成机制.     

包装企业核心竞争力研究

核心竞争力是企业赖以生存和发展的关键要素.介绍了企业核心竞争力的内涵,分析了我国包装企业的现状及存在的问题,提出了提高包装企业核心竞争力的战略措施.