Title: Who are the world leaders in innovation? Exploring the changing role of firms in emerging economies

Authors: Cristina Chaminade; Claudia De Fuentes

Addresses: CIRCLE, Lund University, P.O. Box 117, S-22100 Lund, Sweden ' Sobey School of Business, Saint Mary's University, 923 Robie Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3H 3C3, Canada

Abstract: Recent literature shows that differences in structural characteristics at country level are important determinants of the innovative capacities and growth performance of different countries. Based on firm-level data collected from a survey, this study identifies who are the world leaders, followers, and marginalised firms in a sample of nine countries and a selection of industries in terms of firms' characteristics, the characteristics of the region where they are located, as well as the firm strategies to engage in global innovation networks. Our results, based on a small sample, show that some firms from emerging economies are among the exclusive group of world leaders and some firms from developed economies are among world followers and marginalised. Without attempting to generalise our results, the findings confirm the changing role of some firms in emerging economies from followers to world leaders in innovation.

Keywords: technology clubs; technological capabilities; region tier; global innovation networks; GINs; Europe; China; Brazil; India; South Africa; innovative capacities; growth performance; emerging economies; world leaders.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTLID.2015.073035

International Journal of Technological Learning, Innovation and Development, 2015 Vol.7 No.4, pp.279 - 302

Received: 27 Dec 2014
Accepted: 31 Dec 2014
Published online: 13 Nov 2015 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article