This work investigates the relationship between sustainability and innovation performance. Despite the relevance of the issue, few contributions deepen such a relationship after both a conceptual and a quantitative perspective. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to suggest a measure of sustainability for innovation processes and to define which innovation strategies can lead to more sustainable processes. The role of ambidexterity within the corporate sustainability framework is underlined: Ambidextrous organizations are able to improve the innovation performance and better use their resources, improving the sustainability of research and development (R&D) processes. By employing patent data and testing the framework on a sample of worldwide top R&D spending companies in the IT hardware industry, this work suggests which optimal value of ambidexterity will lead to more sustainable innovation. In addition, R&D processes with non-optimal levels of ambidexterity can be managed in a better way. Indeed, results show the usefulness of open innovation adoption to improve the performance of exploration processes. Moreover, R&D activities based on a preponderance of exploitation strategies are more sustainable if they fall into technological domains in which the focal company is highly specialized. The work also contributes to the conceptualization of sustainability and to definition of patent-based metrics related to sustainability.

On 25 October 2015 the United Nations approved The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs). It is an important event from different points of view: clear judgment was expressed on the unsustainability of current development models, not only on the environmental level, but also on the economic and social ones. The implementation of the agenda requires a strong involvement of all members of society, especially business. The article aims to provide a literature overview on the relationships between innovation and sustainable development objectives in the industrial context. SDGs are also analyzed in terms of stakeholders involved, reactions of companies and citizens and metrics recently proposed by researchers of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC). These preliminary results show that different stakeholders approach the SDGs differently, but also that the interest of companies toward SDGs is growing, confirming the considerations that emerged in literature. Furthermore, some SDGs appear to be more a prerequisite for achieving targets, than actual goals, while innovation has proven to be a driver for most SDGs.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate possible improvements in the pursuit of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) by multinational enterprises (MNEs) through an analysis of the literature. Design/methodology/approach A critical framework based on Gleicher’s formula for change is provided after conducting a systematic literature review. Findings The best way to pursue the SDGs is through an integrated approach that recognises the importance of MNEs in terms of possibilities and power of action. Working towards the SDGs appears to be largely limited by three aspects of the problem: its complexity and wickedness, the genuine interest in reaching some SDGs, at the expense of profit and low foresight. Research limitations/implications A fundamental limitation of the study concerns, as in most of the literature on the matter, the impossibility of providing an optimal solution to the problem of meeting the SDGs, given their nature. However, formulating the best definition of the problem and its characteristics can contribute to making its management better. Social implications This study has social implications due to the extreme importance that many SDGs have with regard to democracy and social equity, beyond their environmental and economic aspects. Originality/value The claimed contribution is the value brought by the synthesis of several points of view, through the interdisciplinary analysis of the research question. The novelty consists in organising the literature according to the formula for change.

This article aims to identify the features of sustainability-oriented innovation starting from the content analysis of patent abstracts. An automatic tool was developed capable of finding the keywords, or groups of keywords, related to the 169 targets of sustainable development goals (SDGs). Once the patents deemed useful for pursuing SDGs were selected through the tool, they were analyzed to obtain information on their features in terms of breadth, scope, novelty, openness, prior art and scientific base. Among the most significant results, it is found that a larger number of applicants, suggesting the adoption of “open innovation” strategies, contributes to sustainability orientation. Moreover, patent originality contributes to the probability of pursuing sustainable objectives, especially related to environmental issues. On the contrary, claims are inversely correlated with the attitude to pursue SDGs, i.e., the larger number of areas in which a patent claims to intervene, the lower the probability that such innovation is sustainable. The results obtained by adopting a quantitative approach are in line with suggestions proposed by the literature and, so far, only supported by logical arguments or case studies. The potential of the tool developed, applied to the field of innovation and sustainability, is demonstrated as significant.