Title: Alignment in collaborative new product development. Comparing small and large firms

Authors: Luis Filipe Silva; António Carrizo Moreira

Addresses: ISCA-UA, University of Aveiro, R. Associação Humanitária dos Bombeiros Voluntários de Aveiro, 3810-500 Aveiro, Portugal ' DEGEIT, GOVCOPP, University of Aveiro, Campus Universitário de Santiago, Aveiro, 3810-193, Portugal

Abstract: This paper aims at investigating how alignment is performed by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and large firms and its impact on collaborative new product development (CNPD). Also, this study considers the influence of innovation on inter-firm alignment. This study was performed through six in-depth interviews. Case studies were used to describe the reality of study. The results show that the greater intensity of alignment stems from the sharing of strategic information between firms involved in the initial phases of CNPD, influenced by the trust and commitment created in the supplier-client relationship when generating radical innovation. Also, results show that the larger intensity of alignment in CNPD is not influenced by firm size, despite being greater in the reality of large firms. This study complements the existing literature on alignment by investigating how firms align upstream according to their size. Likewise, this study contributes to reduce the knowledge gap about the influence of innovation generated in CNPD on the intensity of alignment.

Keywords: alignment; collaborative new product development; CNPD; new product development; inter-firm alignment; inter-firm collaboration; small and medium-sized enterprise; SMEs; large firms.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBIR.2021.112813

International Journal of Business Innovation and Research, 2021 Vol.24 No.2, pp.167 - 196

Received: 28 Oct 2018
Accepted: 03 Jul 2019
Published online: 04 Feb 2021 *

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