Technological innovation without R&D: unfolding the extra gains of management innovations on technological performance

Abstract

This paper analyses how management (organisational and marketing) innovations influence non-R&D technological innovators’ performance. Drawing on Community of Innovation Survey data to examine 5878 non-R&D Spanish firms, results indicate that the joint introduction of management innovations with technological innovations improves technological innovative performance thanks to the creation of complex innovation capabilities. Thus, the joint adoption of management and technological innovations in tandem is linked to a premium effect on performance based on complementarities. Non-R&D technological innovators heavily use organisational and marketing activities in order to compensate for their lack of engagement in R&D activities. This is the first paper that brings the management innovation literature into the non-R&D technological innovators debate, using a resource-based view framework.

Keywords:

• Business & Management Studies
• Technology & Innovation Studies
• econometric
• innovation strategy

Acknowledgements

This paper is part of the INNOCLUSTERS Research Project Directed by Dr Hervas-Oliver, JL, funded by the Ministry of Economics and Competitiveness in Spain (ECO2010-17318). EUROSTAT data is acknowledged.

Notes on contributors

Jose-Luis Hervas-Oliver, PhD, is Associate Professor at the Universidad Politecnica de Valencia (Spain) and the Florida State University, IP (USA). His research interests are located at the intersection of strategic management and innovation. He teaches strategic management and innovation topics at both postgraduate and undergraduate levels. Dr Hervas-Oliver has been a Visiting Scholar in the London School of Economics and Political Science at the MERIT-Maastricht University, and the Edinburgh University, among others. Dr Hervas-Oliver has been published in leading journals such as Journal of Economic Geography, Technovation, Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, Journal of Technology Transfer, Research-Technology Management, International Journal of Technology Management, Economics of Innovation and New Technology, among many others. He has also edited books about innovation in leading editorials as Springer, and contributed to books in Edward Elgar, Springer, among others.

Francisca Sempere-Ripoll is an industrial engineer by training, earning her PhD at the Universidad Politecnica de Valencia, where she teaches innovation, management and production issues. She has extensive experience in the industry, mainly as a consultant of innovation. She has also been published in leading journals such as Small Business Economics and books edited by Springer, among others. She is focused on understanding and disentangling technological and non-technological innovation strategies, working hand-in-hand with practitioners.

Carlos Boronat-Moll is an industrial engineer by training, earning his PhD at the Universidad Politecnica de Valencia (Valencia, Spain) in 2012. He has extensive experience in the industry, mainly as a consultant of innovation. He has also been published in leading journals such as Small Business Economics. He is focused on understanding and disentangling technological process innovation, working hand-in-hand with practitioners.

Ronald Rojas is an industrial engineer by training, earning his PhD at the Universidad Politecnica de Valencia (Valencia, Spain) in 2010. He has extensive experience in the industry, mainly as a consultant of innovation. He has also been published in journals such as Journal of Intellectual Capital. He is focused on understanding and disentangling technological innovation in developing nations, working especially in low-tech industries.

Notes

1. After 2008, the Spanish questionnaire modified and changed the variable in order to capture the idea of objectives (similar to ‘innovation goals’, related to technological trajectories in the sense of Dosi (1982)) or factors behind the decision to innovate. The same approach is observed in the CIS for the UK questionnaire: CIS5 and CIS6 versions mention factors or objectives, while the previous third and fourth version mention effects.