Innovation, Alliances, and Networks in High-Tech Environments

Recent decades have been characterized by an increasing number of strategic alliances, mergers and acquisitions and more general collaborative networks. This phenomenon has primarily involved knowledge-intensive and high-tech industries where innovation is a key competitive weapon. This book focuses on the role of these partnerships and provides new insights into how they contribute to increasing innovation performance. It fills a gap in the existing literature by examining specific contributions of absorptive capacity of firms, knowledge networks and spillovers.

Recent years have seen a growth in strategic alliances, mergers and acquisitions and collaborative networks involving knowledge-intensive and hi-tech industries. However, there have been relatively few studies looking at this form of collaboration as a strategy to drive firms’ innovative performances. This book specifically focuses on the role of strategic alliances, M&A and innovation networks, providing insights on if and how they contribute to boosting firms’ innovation performances.

The book has a double purpose. Firstly, it investigates at an industry level the role played by the alliance, M&As and networks in high-tech environments such as biotechnology, pharmaceutical, software and nanotechnology in creating, transforming and reshaping the dynamics inside and between industries. Secondly, it explores the impact at the firm level of factors such as cognitive distance, management capabilities, and relational and social capabilities, on firms’ global innovation capacity, measured as innovation quantity, innovation quality and innovation novelty. The book will be of interest to scholars working on the economics of innovation, innovation management studies, strategic management, regional science and evolutionary economics, among other areas.