Innovation, industry and firm age: are there new knowledge production functions?

Abstract

In this paper we investigate how the knowledge production function is at work in different industrial sectors comparing mature and young companies in Italy. We estimate a two-step model using community innovation survey data. We provide evidence that young firms are particularly effective in translating R&D into product innovation in 'entrepreneurial sectors' (especially in services where it is likely that capital requirements and experience are negligible), while mature companies turn out to be more effective in translating technological acquisitions (TAs) into process innovation in 'routinized sectors' (especially in low-tech manufacturing industries where the main strategy is cost reduction).

Internationalization and product innovation in ASEAN: The moderating role of organizational innovation

“…Following previous literature, we employ several standard control variables to control for firm, industry, and country heterogeneity (Abubakar et al, 2019; Anzola‐Román et al, 2018; Gkypali, Rafailidis, & Tsekouras, 2015; Pellegrino & Piva, 2019). Two firm‐level controls are firm age ( Age ) and firm size ( Size ).…”

Innovation drivers of external competitiveness in the great recession

“…This is mostly due to the lack of (technological and financial) internal resources that are required to develop large R&D projects. 3 On the other hand, a recent empirical literature (see, for a review, Pellegrino and Piva 2020 ) has emphasized the key role that young and small innovative firms can play in driving innovation in sectors characterized by lower appropriability conditions and higher technological opportunities (i.e., “entrepreneurial sectors”). However, despite SMEs are less likely to conduct formal R&D than larger firms, their relative efficiency (i.e., number of patents and innovations by unit of R&D input) in performing R&D can be higher (see for instance Acs and Audretsch 1990 ; Conte and Vivarelli 2014 ).…”

The role of demand in fostering product vs process innovation: a model and an empirical test

“…As far as the technology-push hypothesis is concerned (see Section 1), the role of firm's knowledge stock is taken into account by the inclusion of the lagged dependent variable. Controls include: 1) firm's size (measured through employment) -since larger firms are more likely to have their own R&D department performing formalized R&D activities and should be less constrained in financing costly and uncertain R&D investments, while SMEs mainly rely on non-R&D types of innovation (see Cohen and Levin 1989, 1996b; Expósito and Sanchis-Llopis; 2) firm's age, since more experienced incumbents are more likely to massively invest in R&D (see Huergo and Jaumandreu 2004;Artés 2009;Pellegrino and Piva 2020; 3) company's belonging to a business group (dummy variable), since firms taking part to a business group have more opportunities to share the uncertainty implied by innovation activities (see Filatotchev et al 2003;4) year and sectoral dummies, the latter taking into account sector-specific technological opportunities (see Section 1). Therefore, our econometric test will be based on the following specification:…”