An Investigation of Spanish SME Innovation during Different Economic Conditions

Abstract

This study investigates product, process, and management innovation among a sample of Spanish manufacturing small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) during the current economic downturn and a period of economic growth. Tobit analyses examined whether the level of process, product, and management innovation changed during the recessionary period relative to the expansionary period; and MCO estimations were used to show whether the recession affected the relationship between SME innovation and performance. Three main findings are: (1) innovation among Spanish manufacturing SMEs declined during the recent economic crisis; (2) the type of innovation at Spanish manufacturing SMEs changed during different economic conditions; and (3) innovation was positively associated with firm performance during the economic expansion and recession years. The results demonstrate the importance of adopting innovation into SME strategy over the business cycle. The findings have relevance to SMEs, government policymakers, and providers of consulting services.

On Process Innovation Capabilities in SMEs: A Taxonomy of Process-Oriented Innovative SMEs

“…Hitherto, scant attention has been paid to the understanding of process‐oriented innovators as a specific group, performing primarily process development rather than product (De Massis et al ; Frishammar et al ; Hervas‐Oliver, Sempere‐Ripoll, and Boronat‐Moll ; Hollen, Van Den Bosch, and Volberda ; Keupp, Palmie, and Gassmann ; Madrid‐Guijarro, Garcia‐Perez‐de‐Lema, and Van Auken ; Stadler ), especially in the context of SMEs (De Massis et al ; Madrid‐Guijarro, Garcia‐Perez‐de‐Lema, and Van Auken ). When process innovation has been studied, it has been done restricting such studies to just predicting process innovators, in relation to product innovation, or understanding process innovation in particular (process‐oriented) industries.…”

“…Responding to different calls for more research on innovation for SMEs (De Massis et al ; Madrid‐Guijarro, Garcia‐Perez‐de‐Lema, and Van Auken ) and process innovation (Organisation for Economic Co‐operation and Development ; Keupp, Palmie, and Gassmann ; Hervas‐Oliver, Sempere‐Ripoll, and Boronat‐Moll ; Frishammar et al ), the aim of this paper has been to answer the following research question: what innovation pattern do process‐oriented innovative SMEs follow? Answering this question has allowed us to construct a taxonomy of process‐oriented innovators from empirical data, classifying them according to their capabilities, innovation activities and performances.…”

“…A number of SME researchers focus on product innovation (Madrid‐Guijarro, Garcia‐Perez‐de‐Lema, and Van Auken ; Nieto, Santamaria, and Fernandez ; Rammer, Czarnitzki, and Spielkamp ) revealing a traditional focus on the exploration of product development (Acs and Audretsch ; De Jong and Vermeulen ; De Massis et al ; Stam and Wennberg ). Conversely, here we focus on process innovation.…”

Government Policies and Firm Size as a Moderating Effect of Innovation on Business Performance

“…Compared to large companies, SMEs may be more willing to make risky investments, and practice innovative behavior to improve business performance [11,12]. Therefore, SMEs need to evaluate competitive strategies that are carried out, and incorporate innovations into SME activities to achieve longterm success [13,14].…”

Impacto de las fuentes externas de conocimiento en la innovación de productos de empresas de baja y media baja intensidad tecnológica

“…Además, a pesar de sus limitaciones, las Pyme realizan innovaciones que les permiten mantenerse competitivas (Madrid-Guijarro, García-Pérez-de-Lema y Van-Auken, 2013;González Campo y Hurtado Ayala, 2014). Para realizarlas, muchas adoptan el nuevo paradigma de la innovación abierta (Brunswicker y Vanhaverbeke, 2015), que consiste en la búsqueda de fuentes de conocimientos externos, como una de las prácticas más frecuentes.…”