A well-known dilemma in strategic marketing is whether a firm can be simultaneously both efficient in its existing business and innovative in creating new business (Atuahene-Gima 2005; Christensen 1997). Beleaguered companies such as AOL, Kmart, Motorola, Nokia, Polaroid, and Sears are examples that were once highly efficient in serving customers, but partly due to that efficiency in their existing business, paradoxically failed to introduce innovations. The potential tension “between innovation and efficiency—is one that’s bedeviling CEOs everywhere” (Hindo 2007). Two questions regarding the efficiency–innovation tradeoffs are especially intriguing to researchers and managers alike. First, to what extent are such tradeoffs driven by efficient firms’ lack of eagerness or willingness to innovate in the first place, or lack of ability to innovate and promote innovations? Second, can certain strategic marketing factors mitigate the tension of such tradeoffs? Indeed, anecdotal evidence indicates that not all firms that are efficient in their current business (e.g., Charles Schwab, Capital One) lack innovative thrust. In fact, efficient firms may actually be eager to innovate: Nokia, for instance, originally innovated an online “app store” service as well as touchscreen smartphones and Internet tablets in the 1990s and 2000s, much earlier than Apple (Ben-Aaron 2009; MobileGazzette 2008). Similarly, Polaroid was originally a pioneer in developing digital cameras and imaging services in the 1980s (Tripsas and Gavetti 2000). The eventual failures of Nokia’s and Polaroid’s innovation efforts, thus, do not seem to be due to their lack of eagerness to innovate, but perhaps the inability to manage the efficiency–innovation tension. In contrast, other companies seem to be able to manage this tension. For instance, in financial services, Charles Schwab is often commended both for its efficiency and its innovativeness, and the firm itself feels the “need to invest in innovation to maintain a competitive edge” (Gilson 2012). Against this backdrop, we focus on two questions: (1) What exactly are the tradeoffs and tensions between a firm’s existing efficiency, innovativeness in its new offerings, and new offering performance? And (2) how can strategic marketing assets such as customer base and advertising intensity mitigate the tradeoffs? Should such assets help to alleviate the inherent tension, they would give executives tools to pursue both efficiency and innovation at the same time and succeed with their new innovative offerings. Empirically, we focus on the service sector, whereby the actual technical development of innovations is not very costly in tangible financial terms (Crawford and di Benedetto 2008; Droege et al. 2009; Thomke 2003)―making the intangible firm capabilities most likely determinants of (innovation) performance rather than tangible resources (cf. Vorhies, Morgan, and Autry 2009). Therewith, we examine our research questions with a comprehensive census dataset of all new service introductions (n≈500) in one national market: The Finnish mutual funds industry (1997–2010). The sector of financial services is especially relevant for the efficiency–innovation tradeoffs because in this sector, many firms are compelled to engage in both efficient operations and effective (financial) innovations. Our empirical focus on all firms in one market precisely identifies and measures the efficiency levels of all competing firms, relative to the best-performing competitors, as well as innovativeness (earliness) in introducing new services compared to all rivals. For a marketing perspective, we focus on firms’ existing customer-perceived service efficiency (over the entire portfolio of existing services, i.e., funds)—defined through the ratio of output value that customers obtain from the firms’ current services to the (customer) cost inputs. We also carefully delineate between (a) innovativeness of a new service introduction and (b) its performance. Doing so can reveal the potentially contradictory effects of existing efficiency on new service innovativeness (willingness to innovate) vis-à-vis new service performance (ability to make innovations succeed). As our key results, we firstly identify and explicate the baseline efficiency–innovation tradeoffs. Specifically, our results suggest that while existing service efficiency increases the innovativeness of new services introduced by the firm, it simultaneously (1) leads to decreased business performance for the new services introduced and (2) diminishes the positive influence of innovativeness on performance. In sum, these findings imply that on the baseline, highly efficient service firms may be too eager to innovate, considering the sub-par performance they are likely to receive for those innovations. Secondly, our results reveal two strategic marketing factors, which have the potential to mitigate the tradeoffs. We find that the firm’s (a) focused customer base and (b) high advertising intensity can nullify the negative effect of existing service efficiency on innovativeness and the negative moderating effect of efficiency on the innovativeness–performance link.

This study explores influencing factors for firms’ willingness to participate in open innovation. We identify commitment and trust, switching cost, and IT infrastructure as the key predecessors. The study further examines how these variables affect the firms’ participation in open innovation using datasets from the UK biotechnology industry.

This research deals about the phenomenon of crowd-funding as an interesting way of interactive marketing where consumers are involved in co-creation value. Our research objective is to evaluate the impact of the type of rewards (financial vs. symbolic) on consumer level of investment. We propose an experimental design with a real case study in order to evaluate the impact of the type of rewards (financial vs. symbolic) towards the intention of investing in the project. The results indicate that the financial reward brings higher level of investment than the symbolic one. Moreover, in the case of a financial reward, attitude towards investment into the project is significantly higher than for symbolic reward. This research illustrates the key role playing by the value-marketing proposition in this particular context of collaborative investment where consumers as investors are more sensitive to a financial reward than a symbolic one.

This study addressed service innovation as a process of co-construction and sense-making by companies, customers and other partners. The aim of the study was to investigate the role of communication in fostering service innovation as a process of social construction. Five key communication practices intervening in service innovation were identified.

Research on new product development has emphasized the importance of integrating customers, employees, and suppliers in an organization’s innovation processes. While several studies evaluate respective participatory processes, there is, surprisingly, no consensus on which dimension participation quality consists of, and how to measure them consistently. The present study contributes to the literature by identifying the dimensions of participation quality and by constructing a participation quality scale that includes six dimensions, namely (1) project-related resources, (2) early involvement, (3) degree of influence, (4) transparency of processes, (5) incentive mechanisms, and (6) voluntariness of participation. Furthermore, a 24-item measure of participation quality is developed using a mixed-method design. Results of our study show that the developed measure impacts important innovation-related outcomes such as innovation performance, acceptance of the innovation, and intention to participate in future innovation projects. Given that the six identified dimensions of participation quality differentially affect these outcomes, the scale provides the opportunity to better design participatory innovation projects, and thus helps managers to integrate stakeholders more successfully in these projects.

To stay ahead in today’s competitive landscape service firms must continually innovate their offerings and processes (Thakur and Hale 2013). Spurred by this focus on innovation, there has been a tremendous growth in service firms over the past decade. Service innovation has been recognized as the engine of renewal and reason for the growth of the services sector. Although the concept service innovation is gaining increased attention, the question of what a service innovation really is remains unanswered. Traditionally, research on service innovation has separated radical and incremental innovations (see e.g. Gallouj and Weinstein, 1997), and product and process innovations (Vaux Halliday and Trott, 2010). This suggests that there are different conceptualizations that can be used to categorize service innovation. The basis of this research is a literature review. This systematic literature review is based on 879 empirical and conceptual articles used in order to identify conceptualizations of categories of service innovation. In total, 43 categories of service innovation were identified. These conceptualizations were analyzed to show what the benefits and drawbacks are with the different categories. We identify five unique conceptualizations of categories that emphasize different traits of service innovation (1) degree of change in the offering, (2) type of change in the content of the offering, (3) degree of newness in the offering, (4) type of change in the organization and (5) alternative means to an innovative offering. Our review of categories of service innovation provides evidence that the research field is diverse and moving in a number of alternative directions The results indicate that most conceptualizations of service innovation are in-ward focus and views innovations as something that is (only) new to the firm. In addition, the view that service innovations must have an effect is neglected, both in terms of effect on customer behavior and financial performance. Furthermore, this review shows that a service innovation can be anything from an improvement of a single service characteristic to the introduction of an offering that is new to the world. By showing the plethora of conceptualizations of service innovation it is possible to create a common platform to discuss and develop service innovations beneficial for the firm.

This study examined the impact on a firm’s product innovation success when it expands internationally into a host country with political, economic and cultural institutions different from those it is accustomed to at home. Data on 917 Chinese manufacturing firms’ international activities were analyzed to demonstrate that expansion to countries with political institutions better developed than those of a firm’s home country promotes innovation success, as does expansion to countries characterized by greater individualism than the home country. A more advanced economy in the host country strengthens these relationships. This study was designed to contribute to the extant literature in three areas. First, it was designed to enrich the theory explaining how the institutional environment affects firm performance in an emerging economy. Most previous studies have examined the relationship between the institutional environment and the probability of organizational survival or financial performance (e.g., Xu & Shenkar, 2002; Gaur & Lu, 2007), but this study instead examined the institutional environment and product innovation. Product innovation is, after all, a primary way in which many firms compete and grow (Eisenhardt & Tabrizi, 1995; Wu, 2012). Second, previous research has not clearly identified how different components of the institutional environment individually relate to product innovation success, nor have previous studies sufficiently explored their interactions. This study was designed to fill that gap by integrating the literature on new institutional economics, product innovation and the international expansion of emerging market firms. It sought to derive and test propositions explaining how political institutions and cultural norms relate to product innovation success, and to what extent the relationships depend on economic development. Then, this study extended previous research on the institutional environment to an emerging market context. Evidence clarifying the relationships between different components of the institutional environment and the innovation performance of emerging market firms would be relevant for designing effective and efficient international expansion strategies for emerging market firms. These findings therefore enrich our understanding of the impact of the institutional environment by showing its multifaceted influence on product innovation. Previous research has highlighted the important role of institutional differences between the home and foreign countries in strategic decision making and performance (e.g., Kostova & Zaheer, 1999; Xu & Shenkar, 2002). This study has extended that by clearly demonstrating the importance of differences in political institutions and individualism with respect to innovation performance. This is consistent with the idea that expanding to foreign countries with better-developed political institutions helps a firm avoid the institutional void and political hazards at home and gain access to better-functioning institutions in the host country, which can promote successful product innovation. Individualism in a host country drives a firm to experiment with new technologies and develop new products to satisfy diverse customer needs.

This paper analyses the importance of innovation for 680 EU multinationals subsidiaries involved in international marketing in China, the period of 1998-2009, using unbalanced panel data analysis. To date, the literature on EU subsidiaries has failed to consider product innovation in the strategy interplay in approaching new markets overseas. Building on the resource-based view of the firm, linked with host economic and political institutions, the authors empirically examine the inferential marketing strategy in an EU-China context, by applying econometric techniques to investigate innovation capabilities and to test the presence of agglomeration effect of past innovation activities. We find that EU innovation in China is influenced by both host country institutions and firm capabilities, rendering support to the theory. Our analysis indicates EU subsidiaries’ innovation is positively related to firm advertisement, labour training and host market size. R&D expenditure has a negative bearing on innovation. However, openness has a negative and significant effect on product innovation in China. The study findings have important implications for research on international marketing, new venture decision making, and overseas innovation expansion strategies.

This paper examines how learning orientation and self-efficacy contributed to explaining innovation behaviors. In order to verify the relationships and mediating effect, data were collected from 368 individuals in employees working in small and medium-sized firms at Gyeongnam region to test theoretical model and its hypotheses. All data collected from the survey were analyzed using with SPSS 18.0. This study reports findings as follows: first, the relationship between the learning orientation and the employee's self-efficacy is positively related. Second, there was also a positive correlation between the employee's self-efficacy and the innovation behaviors. Third, the relationship between the learning orientation and the innovation behaviors is positively related. Finally, the employee's self-efficacy played as a partial mediator on the relationship between learning orientation and innovation behaviors. Based on these findings, the implications and the limitations of the study were presented including some directions for future studies.

With the radical changes and advancements of industrial economy, it is required to secure product competitiveness through technological innovations to overcome uncertain environments and generate a driving force for sustainable growth. So the Korea government introduced the superior product selection system in 1996 and has granted such incentives as priority purchasing and contracts the products of SME whose technological capabilities have passed the screening criteria. After analyzing the ambiguity of the evaluation procurement used in designation of excellent product, this study proposed seven detailed indexes for evaluation.

The Purpose of this study is to empirically examine the impact of various internal and external innovation activities of SMEs on their innovation performances in the field of electronics and communication industry. Drawing upon the literature review, internal and external innovation activities are defined and conceptualized, and independent, dependent and moderator variables are developed. We have used survey-based data for this study from the survey of technology innovation activities in manufacturing industry, which was conducted by the Science and Technology Policy Institute (STEPI) in 2010. The main result of this study shows that there were no significant differences in the impact of innovation activities on market performance according to the size of SMEs. On the other hands, we found that there were significant differences in the impact of innovation activities on technological innovation performance according to the size of SMEs. Therefore, in order to make high technological innovation performance, companies in the field of electronics and communication industry need to properly implement the internal and external innovation activities by considering their size.

This paper reviewed the relationship among CEO’s entrepreneurship/risktaking, innovation resistance and innovation performance, and the mediating effect of innovation resistance between CEO’s entrepreneurship/ risktaking and innovation performance. Based on the responses from 219 companies, the results of multiple regression analysis appeared as follow; 1) CEO’s entrepreneurship and risktaking effect negatively on innovation resistance. 2) innovation resistance negatively on innovation performance(process innovation, organization innovation). 3) innovation resistance mediates partly between CEO’s entrepreneurship/ risktaking and innovation performance.

The objective of the present study is to analyze the relationship of suppliers and customer participation in product development process and effects of such participation on product innovation since it is getting more and more weight in manufacturing companies. It is also aimed in this study to explore if business performance of manufacturing companies might be affected by the suppliers participation as well as product innovation that is realizable by such participation. From the analysis, following conclusions could be drawn: First, suppliers participation in manufacturing companies turned out to have influence upon product innovation (standardized coefficient=0.193, C.R=3.510), implying that nothing is more important than the role of suppliers who have intention to realize innovation through participation in manufacturing companies. Second, the analysis showed that customer participation exercised impact upon product innovation of manufacturing companies (standardized coefficient=0.686, C.R=6.433), suggesting that the more customer participate in product development process of manufacturing companies, the more manufacturing companies could sharpen their competitiveness. Third, it was made known from the analysis that the product innovation thanks to suppliers and customer participation in manufacturing companies could have influence upon their business performance (standardized coefficient=0.762, C.R=7.666), signifying that the product innovation of manufacturing companies might depend on the participation of suppliers and manufacturers and, in turn, could affect their own business performance.

This research discusses the characteristics and the implementation strategies for two types of quality metrics to analyze innovation effects in six sigma projects: fixed specification type and moving specification type. Zst, Ppk are quality metrics of fixed specification type that are influenced by predetermined specification. In contrast, the quality metrics of moving specification type such as Strictly Standardized Mean Difference(SSMD), Z-Score, F-Statistic and t-Statistic are independent from predetermined specification. Zst sigma level obtains defective rates of Parts Per Million(PPM) and Defects Per Million Opportunities(DPMO). However, the defective rates between different industrial sectors are incomparable due to their own technological inherence. In order to explore relative method to compare defective rates between different industrial sectors, the ratio of specification and natural tolerance called, Ppk, is used. The drawback of this Ppk metric is that it is highly dependent on the specification. The metrics of F-Statistic and t-Statistic identify innovation effect by comparing before-and-after of accuracy and precision. These statistics are not affected by specification, but affected by type of statistical distribution models and sample size. Hence, statistical significance determined by above two statistics cannot give a same conclusion as practical significance. In conclusion, SSMD and Z-Score are the best quality metrics that are uninfluenced by fixed specification, theoretical distribution model and arbitrary sample size. Those metrics also identify the innovation effects for before-and-after of accuracy and precision. It is beneficial to use SSMD and Z-Score methods along with popular methods of Zst sigma level and Ppk that are commonly employed in six sigma projects. The case studies from national six sigma contest from 2011 to 2012 are proposed and analyzed to provide the guidelines for the usage of quality metrics for quality practitioners.

본 연구는 기업의 혁신전략이 특허생산 및 기업의 기술변화와 신제품개발에 미치는 영향을 분석함으로써 기업의 기술성과를 증대시키는 데 필요한 혁신전략을 도출하고자 하였다. 사용자료는 한국직업능력개발원의 「인적자본기업패널조사」(HCCP)의 1~4차년도 자료와 한국신용평가원의 기업재무자료, 특허청의 기업별 특허출원자료를 결합한 자료이다. 특허생산함수는 영과잉음이항회귀모형(ZINB)을 사용하여 추정하였다. 기업의 기술성과 결정요인은 특허의 내생성을 고려하여 2단계 추정방법을 사용하였고, 2단계 회귀식은 순위로짓모형을 사용하였다. 분석결과, 기업의 혁신전략이 특허생산 및 기업의 기술변화와 신제품개발에 중요한 영향을 미치는 것을 확인할 수 있었다. 첫째, 특허생산에서는 기업의 연구개발투자와 인적자원이 중요한 투입요소로 나타났다. R&D집약도가 높을수록 특허생산이 활발하게 이루어지되 한계생산은 체감하였고, 기업이 보유하고 있는 특허스톡이 많을수록 신규특허의 생산이 활발하였다. 기업의 인적자원수준이 높고 인적자원투자가 많을수록 특허생산이 활발하였고, 기업이 시장선도전략이나 빠른 추종자전략을 추구할 때 안정형 전략을 구사하는 기업에 비해 특허생산이 많았다. 둘째, 기업의 기술성과 결정요인으로는 인적자원의 역할이 중요하였고, R&D집약도는 대기업의 신제품개발에 유의한 영향을 미쳤다. 시장선도전략이나 빠른 추종자전략을 택한 기업의 기술성과가 안정형 전략의 기업보다 높았다. 특허생산이 활발한 기업일수록 기술성과가 높으나, 이는 상당부분 특허의 내생성에 기인한다. 본 연구의 분석결과는 특허의 생산뿐 아니라 특허와 신제품개발과 같은 기술성과와의 연계성을 높이는 전략이 필요하며, 기업특성에 따른 차별화 전략이 필요하다는 것을 시사한다.

본 연구는 기업의 제품혁신 과정에서 기술협력 활동과 전유성의 확보가 제품혁신성과에 어떠한 영향을 미치는지 살펴보았다. 추가적으로 협력활동과 전유성의 상호작용 효과 (전유성의 조절효과)에 대하여 분석하였다. 과학기술연구원에서 조사한 2010년 한국 제조업의 기술혁신조사 자료를 이용한 실증분석 결과 고객과의 협력활동과 계열사와의 협력활동이 제품혁신에 긍정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났다. 또한, 전유성의 그 자체로 제품혁신에 긍정적인 영향을 줄 뿐만 아니라 고객과의 협력활동이 제품혁신에 주는 긍정적인 영향을 배가시키는, 다시 말해 제품혁신에서 전유성의 중요성이 확인되었다. 이러한 연구 결과를 바탕으로 제품혁신 성과를 높이기 위한 전략적 시사점을 도출하였다. 제품혁신에서는 기술협력활동뿐만 아니라 전유성의 확보가 혁신성과를 결정하는 중요한 요인이기에 기업에서는 기술협력활동의 활성화 및 기술의 전유성 확보에 힘써야 할 것이며 이러한 전유성의 확보를 위한 기술보호 수단의 전략적 활용에 대한 통찰이 필요하다.

국제 마케팅 분야에서 제품 전략과 수출 성과의 관계에 관한 연구가 활발히 이루어져 왔다. 이러한 제품 전략과 수출 성과의 관계는 기존 역량의 활용뿐만 아니라 지속적인 혁신활동이 뒷받침되어야 한다. 이에 본 연구는 자원기반이론 관점에서 제품 전략이 수출 성과에 미치는 영향에 관해 살펴보고자 하였으며, 나아가 조직학습관점에서 혁신 역량이 제품 전략과 수출 성과의 관계에 미치는 조절효과에 대해 알아보고자 하였다. 한국 수출업체를 대상으로 한 설문조사를 바탕으로 실증분석을 실시한 결과, 제품 품질 전략과 제품 혁신 전략이 수출 성과에 긍정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났다. 또한 활용적 혁신 역량이 제품 품질 전략과 수출 성과의 긍정적인 관계를 강화하는 것으로 나타났다. 본 연구는 제품 전략과 혁신 역량 간 적합성을 통해 제품 전략이 수출 성과에 미치는 긍정적인 효과를 높일 수 있음을 시사하며, 향후 이와 관련한 선행요인 및 결과요인에 관한 추가적인 연구가 활발하게 이루어질 수 있을 것으로 기대된다.

This paper reviewed the mediating effects of knowledge sharing between social capital(interaction, trust, shared vision) and innovation(radical innovation, incremental innovation) in small businesses. Based on the responses from 337 responses, the results of mediating effect analysis and path analysis showed that interaction and shared vision effect positively on radical innovation and incremental innovation via knowledge sharing or directly, but trust effects positively only on incremental innovation. Social capital and knowledge sharing have more effects on incremental innovation than on radical innovation.

The purpose of this study is to figure out the impacts of technological innovation and cost management on productivity in small shipping industries to come up with developmental implications. To achieve this, a survey was carried out to 150 workers in small shipbuilding industries through April 2 to April 20, 2012. As for findings stated above, technological innovation and cost management in the Korean small shipbuilding industries were key factors that elevate financial and non-financial productivity. In the light of low technological prowess and cost structure of small shipbuilding industries, their productivity can be improved when intensive cost management with production factor technology as know-how is realized through quality management, which product development technology is the top priority as an independent niche strategy. Consequently, the combination of infrastructures in small shipbuilding industries with continuous efforts for cost reduction by the link to the systematized structure can't only secure their independent competitiveness, but raise their productivity.