Network Embeddedness and the Exploration of Novel Technologies: Technological Distance, Betweenness Centrality and Density
This paper analyzes the innovation potential of a firms alliance network. We focus on the role of technological distance between partners, a firms network position (centrality) and total network density. We study how these three elements of an alliance network, apart and in combination, affect the twin tasks in exploration, namely novelty creation on the one hand and its efficient absorption on the other hand. We test several hypotheses using technology-based alliance networks in the pharmaceutical, chemical and automotive industry. Our findings lead to several conclusions: (1) successful exploration requires a balance between these two exploration tasks. (2) Different network positions yield different pay-offs in terms of the number of explorative patents. (3)Exploration success depends on the combination of network position, technological distance and network density. These three variables need to be considered jointly in order to understand their complementary effects on both novelty creation and absorptive capacity.
Exploration technology alliance networks technological novelty absorptive capacity technological distance
Victor GILSING Bart NOOTEBOOM Wim VANHAVERBEKE
Eindhoven University of Technology, the Netherlands Tilburg University, the Netherlands Hasselt University, Belgium and TU/e, Netherlands
国际会议
The Fifth InternationalSymposium on Management of Technology(ISMOT07)(第五届技术与创新管理国际研讨会)
杭州
英文
304-308
2007-06-01（万方平台首次上网日期，不代表论文的发表时间）