Who are the most effective R&D partners for different types of product innovation? Evidence from South Korean manufacturing firms

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.

KEYWORDS:

• R&D cooperation
• types of R&D partners
• product innovation
• types of product innovation

JEL CLASSIFICATION:

• O32
• C13

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 (1942), 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.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and National Research Foundation of Korea [NRF-2018S1A3A2075175].