Exploring service development for understanding Schumpeterian innovation in service firms: the deduction of special case criteria

The identification of innovation in services is problematic. This seems remarkable, since many papers have emerged, which emphasize distinctive features of service innovation. However, some of these contributions strain the Schumpeterian innovation opinion or describe in fact the role of service firms in systems of innovation. In the present paper service innovation is concerned as a special case of service development and a direct reference to Schumpeter is made as Drejer proposes (Drejer, I., 2004. Identifying innovation in surveys of services: a Schumpeterian perspective. Research Policy 33, 551-562). With the deduction of ‘special case criteria’ the paper contributes to tackling the identification problem.