Firms undertake different kinds of R&D activities. They do product R&D (R&D aimed at improving the quality of existing products, and creating new products). They also do process R&D (R&D aimed at lowering the cost of making existing and new products). Moreover, firms often do both product and...

The report contextualises the role of data analytics in the ongoing digital revolution and its potential for SME performance, including for enhancing SME productivity. It presents evidence on the use of data analytics in SMEs, discusses main internal and external barriers to the use of data...

This chapter reviews and integrates much of what has been learned on the processes of technological evolution, their main features, and their effects on the evolution of industries. First, we map and integrate the various pieces of evidence concerning the nature and structure of technological...

The main objective of the article is to analyse the current state of the innovation activity among the Russian enterprises. The empirical evidence shows only 13% of the sample indicated that innovation is the first priority for the firm. We propose that the Russian Government designs innovation...

Empirical research has revealed some regularities regarding the innovation that takes place over the industry life-cycle. First, innovation is high when an industry is young and low when the industry matures, and second, product innovation decreases with industry maturity, while process...

This paper develops the theory of a U relation between seller concentration and R&D investment and integrates the new theory with the traditional expectation of an inverted-U relation. The paper illustrates the U relation, and the integrated U and inverted- U relations, for a single type of R&D...

In the branch of luxury cosmetics, counterfeiting is harmful to firms, in terms of image and profitability. Fighting it is hence an important economic stake. In this paper, we study the efficiency of technological innovation as an anti-counterfeiting strategy. Our objective is to determine to...

The availability of ten-years series of Italian business R&D micro-data has allowed for exploring some original paths of micro-analysis on the R&D performances and strategies of Italian firms. By re-focusing economic research on the specific role of R&D in the framework of the broader innovation...

The subject of this article is the analysis of the Italian business R&D expenditure over the 2001-2010 period. Two main features make the Italian case interesting in international comparisons: first, the country has not been able to catch up with the average level of business R&D expenditure in...

Over the past two decades multinational firms from high-technology industries have increasingly relied on outsourcing of production to external suppliers. We present a theoretical framework that stems from the resource-based view of the firm (RBV) and develop hypotheses claiming that outsourcing...