Innovation practices in emerging economies: Do university partnerships matter?

Abstract

Enterprises' resources and capabilities determine their ability to achieve competitive advantage. In this regard, the key innovation challenges that enterprises face are liabilities associated with their age and size, and the entry barriers imposed on them. In this line, a growing number of enterprises are starting to implement innovation practices in which they employ both internal/external flows of knowledge in order to explore/exploit innovation in collaboration with commercial or scientific agents. Within this context, universities play a significant role providing fertile knowledge-intensive environments to support the exploration and exploitation of innovative and entrepreneurial ideas, especially in emerging economies, where governments have created subsidies to promote enterprise innovation through compulsory university partnerships. Based on these ideas, the purpose of this exploratory research is to provide a better understanding about the role of universities on enterprises' innovation practices in emerging economies. More concretely, in the context of Mexico, we explored the enterprises' motivations to collaborate with universities in terms of innovation purposes (exploration and exploitation) or alternatives to access to public funds (compulsory requirement of being involved in a university partnership).

Effectiveness of technology transfer policies and legislation in fostering entrepreneurial innovations across continents: an overview

“…For one hand, the 24% of published studies were primarily contextualized into organizations that design strategies, configure networks, and modify governance structures looking for capturing positive outcomes (performance, productivity and sustainability) through innovation and entrepreneurship orientations that are influenced by R&D investments, IPR laws and corporate venturing public policies (e.g., see Burgelman 1986;Studdard and Darby 2008;Dunlap-Hinkler et al 2010; Ryan and Giblin 2012; Nathan and Lee 2013; Mrożewski and Kratzer 2017; Urbaniec 2018). For the other hand, 21% of published studies were contextualized into universities with capabilities that transform knowledge into disruptive/commercial innovations or technologies but that is also conditioned by IPR laws such as copyright, patents, licenses, trademarks, trade secrets, and among others (e.g., see Goldsmith and Kerr 1991;Zenie 2003;Sáez-Martínez et al 2014;Thongpravati et al 2016;Guerrero et al 2016;Marozau and Guerrero 2016;Guerrero and Urbano 2017;Guerrero et al 2019;Eesley and Miller 2018;Qian et al 2018).…”

Mind the Gap: Lessons from the UK to Brazil about the Roles of TTOs throughout Collaborative R&D Projects

“…The interaction between science and technology is a key characteristic of the NIS (Nelson & Rosenberg, 1993), and different NIS lead to different growth rates, being an important influence to the wealth of nations (Freeman, 2002). Therefore, the generation, transfer and commercialisation of knowledge via university-industry partnerships become pillars for the transformation of emerging economies into innovative economies (Guerrero, Urbano, & Herrera, 2017).…”

“…Also, it could generate misleading implications for the practitioners who may need help in different stages of a R&D project, not only in commercialising the results. Nevertheless, if the literature is well advanced regarding the benefits of relationships between universities and industry for innovation (Guerrero et al, 2017;Scandura, 2016) and punctual activities performed by intermediaries (Agogué, Yström, & Le Masson, 2017;Villani, Rasmussen, & Grimaldi, 2017), it is less advanced in outlining the role of TTOs as intermediaries throughout the entire collaborative innovation project. Therefore, the main purpose of this paper is to identify the roles of TTOs throughout collaborative R&D projects and suggest some lessons for Brazilian TTOs based on the experience of the UK.…”

University Industry Collaboration:

“…There are no specific parameters to this as the focus is on establishing the role universities in intensifying UIC and not to assess the role itself. There are many studies that proof the role of university in a UIC determines the augmentation but not necessarily success [2], [3], [6], [8], which is exactly what UIC must incorporate in the collaboration so that the collaboration is intensified and it grows innovation for economic growth [8].…”