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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore how firms achieve competitiveness by implementing design-driven innovation. Design/methodology/approach This paper is a detailed longitudinal analysis of the design innovation underpinning the Norwegian furniture industry. Using a data set spanning 40 years (1976-2015) of design patents by both Norwegian firms and inventors, the authors map the coinventor connectivity of the design-innovation clusters of Norway, both within the country and with foreign locations. Findings Using network analysis, the authors find that most of the rise of co-inventor connectivity within Norwegian furniture industry’s design innovation is occurring within the country. More surprisingly, the leading firms and star inventors are less likely to collaborate internationally, i.e. they are characterized by greater innovative “lock-in”. Research limitations/implications The exploration of all the potential reasons for the “lock-in” in design innovation of the Norwegian furniture industry is beyond the scope of this paper. A particularly interesting avenue for future research would be to compare the coinventor connectivity of traditional sectors like furniture with more high technology sectors within Norway. Originality/value By assessing a detailed and historical context of the evolution of Norwegian furniture industry, the paper provides a fairly comprehensive study of design innovation as a source of firms’ competitiveness, which has been rarely explored. The authors suggest that innovative “lock-in” may be more likely to arise in the traditional sectors of an economy and the forces may be particularly strong for those firms and individuals that have the highest domestic connectedness and status.