The Conceptual Principles

With regard to the conceptual principles of absorptive capacity, section 2.1.1 first points out how absorptive capacity serves as an important performance-enhancing layer for SMEs. Next, section 2.1.2 explains what role the knowledge source and complementarity and experience as the key antecedents of absorptive capacity play for the two subsets of absorptive capacity, namely ‘potential absorptive capacity’ and ‘realized absorptive capacity’, which are described in section 2.1.3. In the end, section 2.1.4 explains in more detail that these two subsets consist of the four capabilities — acquisition, assimilation, transformation and exploitation — of the model of absorptive capacity, based on

Zahra & George

(2002), before discussing the conceptual principles of organizational culture.