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Introduction: Foundations of Economic Change—Behavior, Interaction and Aggregate Outcomes Read chapter Read first chapter

2017 | OriginalPaper | Chapter

Firms Navigating Through Innovation Spaces: A Conceptualization of How Firms Search and Perceive Technological, Market and Productive Opportunities Globally

Author : Maureen McKelvey

Published in: Foundations of Economic Change

Publisher: Springer International Publishing

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Abstract

The main contribution of this paper is a theory-based conceptual framework of innovation spaces, and how firms must navigate through them to innovate. The concept of innovation systems—at the regional, sectoral and national levels—have been highly influential. Previous literature developing the concept of innovation systems has stressed the importance of institutions, networks and knowledge bases at the regional, sectoral and national levels. This paper primarily draws upon an evolutionary and Schumpeterian economics perspective, in the following three senses. The conceptualization of ‘innnovation spaces’ focuses upon how and why firm search for innovations is influenced the opportunities within certain geographical contexts. This means that the firm create opportunities and can span different context, but they are influence by the context in term of the access, flow and co-evolution of ideas, resources, technology, people and knowledge, which help stimulate business innovation in terms of products, process and services. The paper concludes with an agenda for future research and especially the need to focus on globalization as a process of intensifying linkages across the globe.

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previous chapter Micro to Macro Evolutionary Modeling: On the Economics of Self Organization of Dynamic Markets by Ignorant Actors
next chapter A Proposal for a ‘National Innovation System Plus Subjective Well-Being’ Approach and an Evolutionary Systemic Normative Theory of Innovation
Footnotes
1
The rate and distribution of change across technological areas can be measured empirically in many different ways, including studies of technical aspects, such as performance of new materials, as well as studies of more interrelated economic-technological aspects, such as the ratio of price to performance, or second-order effects on demand.
 
2
Moykr (2002) also proposes a conceptualization of two types of useful knowledge, namely ‘propositional’ (what) and ‘prescriptive’ (how). He argues that much of technology is about ‘prescriptive’ knowledge but is based upon much ‘propositional’ knowledge.
 
3
The use of techniques and instrumentation as well as the use of machines and capital equipment in factories were initially studied, as places where users impacted technical development.
 
4
Note that the concept of business innovation as economic phenomena includes a notion of ‘economic value’. Thereby innovation must be linked to a conceptualization of customer and markets, and not just remain at the stage of an idea. That is why the innovation literature generally distinguishes invention—such as an idea or technical item—from innovation—such as a new product introduced to the market.
 
5
Economic geography and human geography have extensive work on related concepts, including a recent special issue of Regional Studies (Boschma 2012; Healy and Morgan 2012; Shearmur 2011).
 
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Metadata
Title
Firms Navigating Through Innovation Spaces: A Conceptualization of How Firms Search and Perceive Technological, Market and Productive Opportunities Globally
Author
Maureen McKelvey
Copyright Year
2017
Book
Foundations of Economic Change

Print ISBN: 978-3-319-62008-4

Electronic ISBN: 978-3-319-62009-1

Copyright Year: 2017

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62009-1_8