This paper considers the relationship between innovation, ownership and profitability for a panel of manufacturing plants in Ireland and Northern Ireland. Previous literature suggests that innovators are persistently more profitable than non-innovators, but little is known about how this link is...

Are the perceptions of professional economists on transaction costs consistent with make-or-buy decisions made within firms? The answer may have important implications for transaction cost research. Data on firms' outsourcing during the new product development process are taken from a...

Marked differences exist between the institutional and social context for innovation in the UK and Germany. The question addressed here is how these different contexts affect the objectives and organisation of innovation in UK and German manufacturing. In particular, the paper examines the...

Innovation events - the introduction of new products or processes - represent the end of a process of knowledge sourcing and transformation. They also represent the beginning of a process of exploitation which may result in an improvement in the performance of the innovating business. This...

This paper uses UK plant-level survey data to examine the relative importance of industry concentration, technological opportunity and locational factors in determining innovation propensity. <p> The results suggest no evidence that industry concentration has any significant positive effect on...</p>

There is now substantial evidence that locational and agglomeration influences can have a significant positive effect on innovation performance. Networking and boundary-spanning activities are also increasingly recognised as important contributors to innovation success. In this article we...