Innovation Determinants over Industry Life Cycle

This paper analyzes how the influence of firm-level innovation determinants varies over the industry life cycle. Two sets of determinants are distinguished: (1) determinants of a firm’s innovation propensity, i.e. the likelihood of being innovative and (2) determinants of its innovation intensity, i.e. innovation sales. By combining the literature emphasizing firms’ internal resources (micro level) with the research strand on the role of the industry context (meso-level), the paper develops hypotheses about the relative importance of firm-level innovation determinants over the industry life cycle. Estimation of a firm-level model of innovation in Sweden, while acknowledging the stage of the life cycle of the industry a firms belongs to, shows that the importance of the determinants of innovation propensity and intensity are not equal over the stages of an industry’s life cycle.