The purpose of the paper is to explore how the perceived relationship quality is related to the innovation capacity in chains of the traditional food sector. Based on suggestions from theory and previous studies, empirical evidence is drawn from a survey of 90 traditional food chains including...

Networks become increasingly important as external sources of innovation for firms. Through networks firms get in contact with different actors with whom they can exchange information and collaborate. A firm’s ability to be a successful network actor depends on its network competence. This...

Nowadays, innovation is no longer limited to the individual firm but involves increasingly the chain network in which the firm is embedded. The chain network is considered as the place where the internal and external resources of a firm are combined and transformed, leading to innovation...

The European project NetGrow stands for Enhancing the innovativeness of food SMEs through the management of strategic network behavior and network learning performance. It is a FP7 Cooperation project in the theme Food, Agriculture and Fisheries, and Biotechnology with an EC contribution of 3M...

The objective of this elicitation study is to provide insights into farmers’ beliefs which influence their participation in knowledge exchange and innovation networks to enable the enhancement of network participation. A set of facilitating and impeding factors was obtained. Participants...

This paper is concerned with the role of network administrative organizations (NAOs) in the development of social capital in inter-organizational networks aiming at supporting their members to innovate in the food sector through interacting with one another. A multi-case study approach is used...

Organizations no longer compete as independent entities, but as chains (Christopher, 1998; Cox, 1999; Lambert, Cooper, 2000). Consequently, chain strategies became more important in creating competitive advantage (Vickery et al., 2003; Gunasekaran et al., 2004). Despite the growing recognition of the...

The architecture of the firm involves determination of a boundary that encompasses the functions managed by the firm. The past decade has seen substantial reorganization of firms where vertical or horizontal integration has been unbundled into weaker forms of collaborations including value...