175 research outputs found
D and MNCs' innovation performance: An integrated approach
No full textWe propose an integrated framework establishing the environmental and organizational contingencies under which the international dispersion of R&D activities benefits innovation performance in multinational firms. We suggest that R&D dispersion is more likely to enhance innovation performance – the smaller economies of scale and scope in R&D, the greater the technological strength of R&D locations and the stronger intra-firm knowledge integration. Employing a panel dataset of 175 R&D intensive US, EU, and Japanese firms, our findings provide support for this framework and suggest that these contingencies need to be taken into account simultaneously. Technology diversification strengthens rather than weakens the relationship between international R&D and performance, which we attribute to the positive influence of recombining knowledge sourced across diverse locations
sj-docx-1-soq-10.1177_14761270241231724 – Supplemental material for The Long March: The quest for valid text-based indicators of exploration and exploitation
No full textSupplemental material, sj-docx-1-soq-10.1177_14761270241231724 for The Long March: The quest for valid text-based indicators of exploration and exploitation by Nazlihan Ugur, Rene Belderbos, Stijn Kelchtermans and Bart Leten in Strategic Organization</p
The Long March:The quest for valid text-based indicators of exploration and exploitation
No full textSince March outlined the importance of balancing exploration and exploitation in organizational learning, the exploration-exploitation paradigm has received substantial attention in the management literature. Recent studies have used computer-aided text analysis to construct measures of firms' inclination towards exploration or exploitation, using the original set of keywords proposed by James G. March. We propose a structured series of tests to assess the validity of computer-aided text analysis-based measures and demonstrate that the approach used in prior studies is unlikely to deliver valid indicators. We demonstrate that an alternative approach, which relies on a larger library of keywords, including synonyms of the March keywords and selects only those keywords that are informative and that pass validity tests, delivers valid computer-aided text analysis indicators - both for unstructured (news articles) and structured text-bases (annual reports). Our study contributes to the literature on construct validity and has broader implications for the development of computer-aided text analysis-based indicators in strategy and organization research
Mounting corporate innovation performance: The effects of high-skilled migrant hires and integration capacity
No full textWe adopt an organizational learning approach to examine how firms’ recruitment of high-skilled migrants contributes to subsequent firm-level innovation performance. We argue that due to migrants’ often different experience from that of native high-skilled workers, their perspectives on problem-solving and access to non-overlapping knowledge networks will also differ. The implied complementarity between these worker types makes migrant hires a particularly valuable resource in the context of firm-level innovation. We refine our diversity hypothesis further by predicting that migrant hires who add to the firm's cultural diversity should contribute more to firm innovation performance than new high-skilled migrant hires who do not add cultural diversity. Finally, we conjecture that firms with high integration capacity as a function of prior experience of employing high-skilled migrants should derive more innovation-related benefits from migrant hiring than firms with a low integration capacity. We track the inward mobility of high-skilled workers empirically using patents and matched employer-employee data for 16,241 Dutch firms over an 11-year period. We find support for our hypotheses.This article has benefited greatly from the guidance provided by the Guest Editor, Stefano Breschi, and three anonymous reviewers. The authors are grateful also for comments on earlier versions of the paper from Annette Becker, Rene Belderbos, Felix Pöge, Georg von Krogh, Virgilio Failla, Vivianna She, and Thomas Rønde and seminar audiences at Copenhagen Business School, KU Leuven, Tilburg University, Maastricht University, ZTH Zurich and ZEW Mannheim, and participants in the DRUID PhD Academy Conference and the DRUID Summer Conference. The usual caveats appl
Do licensors learn from out-licensing? Empirical evidence from the pharmaceutical industry
No full textThis paper starts by observing that many licensing contracts contain explicit organizational arrangements for transferring the licensed technology, involving repeated and close interaction between the licensing partners. We argue that these interactions provide opportunities for the licensor to learn from the licensee. Using data on 1,861 licensing deals of 254 pharmaceutical and biotech firms between 1995 and 2015, we show that licensors are more likely to cite the inventions from their licensing partner after an out-licensing deal than matched control firm-pairs that do not engage in licensing. The paper makes the following contributions: first, it demonstrates that not only licensees but also licensors can learn from licensing and that this reverse learning stems from the licensor-licensee relation. Second, it shows that firms can learn from directed outward knowledge transfers rather than non-deliberate knowledge spill-outs. Third, we show that the licensor's post-licensing behavior vis-à-vis the licensee reflects targeted learning by tapping into the most valuable components of the licensee's technology portfolio and those new to the licensor. Finally, the paper extends the theoretical framework behind strategic out-licensing decisions. We show that learning from out-licensing is an additional (positive) element in the trade-off faced by licensors in addition to short-term revenue generation and the risk of long-term rent dissipation.sponsorship: Acknowledgments Financial support from Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO) is gratefully acknowledged (PhD Fellowship, grants 11X6616N and 11X6618N) . (Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO)|11X6616N, Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO)|11X6618N)status: Publishe
The Hard Way? Learning and Drug Development Success (or Failure) in the Pharmaceutical Industry
No full textSequentiality and Simultaneity in R&D Collaboration With Multiple Partner Types: Complexity and Managerial Resource Constraints in R&D Projects
No full textR&D collaborations involving multiple types of partners have the potential to generate impactful innovations but also pose significant coordination challenges. Taking a coordination perspective, this study develops and tests a theoretical framework on the optimal temporal coordination of partner relationships in such collaborations. We argue that the effective coordination of multiple types of collaboration partners in R&D projects requires a balanced approach, combining episodes of simultaneous involvement of all partners with periods of sequential engagement with individual partners. Moreover, we propose that the relative emphasis on simultaneous versus sequential involvement depends on project-specific factors, including the complexity of technology development and the availability of managerial resources. Our analysis of 454 R&D projects undertaken by a major European electronics firm, in collaboration with diverse partner types (science-based partners such as universities and research institutions, versus market-based partners such as suppliers and customers), provides robust empirical support for these hypotheses.A previous version of this paper was a finalist in the Best Paper Awardcompetition of the Strategy Division of the 80th AoM Academy ofManagement Conference. We thank AoM participants, Dries Faems,Keld Laursen, Victor Gilsing and Jason Davies for helpful commentson earlier drafts
Multinational firms and the quest for global talent: Employing (skilled) foreign workers at home and abroad
No full textMultinational firms can access global talent in two ways: by employing migrants in their home country, or by employing foreign workers in their overseas affiliates. Taking a knowledge based perspective, we conceptualize these employment decisions as simultaneous and subject to management coordination. Substitution effects are greater when there is a larger wage cost differential between home and host countries, leading to a cost reduction motivation for foreign expansion and the offshoring of employment. Substitution also occurs when R&D intensive firms employ highly skilled and internationally mobile foreign workers and employ these where the worker’s knowledge and skills can be most productively put to use. In contrast, a complementary relationship occurs when the migrant country exhibits a high contextual distance with the home country of the firm, leading to knowledge (diversity) benefits of migrant employment at home when expanding abroad. Analyzing employee-employer and foreign affiliate data for multinational firms in the Netherlands (2008-2016) and estimating simultaneous equation models, we find support for these hypotheses. Our findings suggest that policies that restrict immigration may have a negative impact on the competitiveness of home country multinational firms by limiting their ability to engage in value enhancing coordination of domestic and foreign employment growth.status: Published onlin
MSI Discussion Paper MSI_2112
No full textWhile their expertise and scientific excellence make academic star scientists attractive collaboration partners for firms, this study indicates that firms face difficulties in capturing value from collaborations with academic stars. Stars are time constrained, may be less committed to
commercialization, and can be a source of undesired knowledge spillovers to other firms. The purpose of this study is to recognize the contingencies under which collaboration with star scientists is positively associated with a firm’s ability to produce valuable patents (invention
performance). We analyze a panel dataset on the collaborations in basic research(publication data) and invention performance (patent output) of 60 prominent pharmaceutical firms. We find that basic research collaboration with academic stars is on average not associated with a performance premium above the overall positive influence of collaborating with academia. We only observe this premium if the star scientist abstains from simultaneous collaboration with other firms
(‘dedication’) and extend her collaboration with the firm to involvenot only basic but also applied research (‘translation’). Extending prior work that has focused on corporate star scientists, we find that if the collaboration involves an internal firm star scientist, a translational contribution of the
academic star is no longer a prerequisite, and may even be detrimental to inventive performance. Our findings inform the literatures on industry-science links and firms’ (scientific) absorptive capacity by revealing the crucial contingencies for firms to benefit from partnering with the best
and brightest among academic scientists.
Practitioner Points:
- Intuitively we may expect that collaborating with the very top among academics benefits firms, yet collaborating with these academic star scientists also entails important challenges.
- Organizations seeking to benefit from the extraordinary expertise of academic star scientists should take into account two important conditions:
o The top academic should be a dedicated collaboration partner, and avoid simultaneous collaboration with other firms.
o The top academic should not only be involved in basic research but also in applied research collaboration with the firm, enhancing her ability to assist the firm in the translation of research into a marketable product.
- When the firm also employs a star scientist who is engaged in the collaborative research with an academic star scientist, the translation of the joint research is better performed by the internally employed star scientists instead of the academic star scientist.status: Publishe
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