ABSTRACT
R&D cooperation is a key to combining firms’ internal and external technological capabilities. This article empirically investigates the effect of R&D cooperation partners on different types of product innovation. This study considers four types of partners in R&D cooperation: suppliers, customers, competitors, and universities. Three purposes of product innovation are considered: diversification of products, pioneering a new market, and standardization of technology. The main findings are: (1) R&D cooperation with suppliers and competitors has a positive effect on standardization of technology, (2) R&D cooperation with customers has a positive effect on diversification of products and pioneering a new market, and (3) R&D cooperation with universities has a positive effect on pioneering a new market and standardization of technology.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1 We do not consider the R&D amount a control variable because it is highly correlated with the firm size variable. According to Schumpeter (Citation1942), large firms are more likely to be more active in new technology development because of economies of scale. That is, large companies are more likely to engage in R&D activities.