In an era of intense knowledge-based globalization and technology-based competition, the central role of networks, alliances and partnerships is now becoming recognized. By looking at the dynamics of these strategic organizational activities, leading authors in the field examine, in this book, how firms align themselves, how they use networks and enter into partnerships in order to develop new or radically improved processes, and how they introduce new or radically improved products to the market. The topic excludes, as the primary interest, spatial effects, such as those found in geographic clusters, or in regional innovation systems. The focus here is instead on the innovation process, and therefore examines framework issues about how we can assess networks of innovators, measurement issues for both researchers and official statisticians, and impact issues for both industry strategists and policy makers.

Using an evolutionary perspective, and drawing on a range of disciplines, Networks, Partnerships and Alliances explores important issues at the conceptual, methodological and comparative levels concerning the construction of comparative advantage.

Inhalt
I: Introduction and Frameworks.- 1. Introduction.- 2. Private-Sector and Public Sector Strategies to Encourage Technological Alliances.- 3. Collaborative Innovation: Rationale, Indicators and Significance.- II: Measurement.- 4. An Analysis of Patterns of Collaboration in Canadian Manufacturing and Biotechnology Firms.- 5. In-House Versus Ex-House: The Sourcing of Knowledge for Innovation.- III: Practice.- 6. Innovation Through Linkages and Networks at the National Research Council: Measuring the Output.- 7. R&D Alliances and Networks Indicators at the Division of Science Resources Statistics, National Science Foundation.- 8. Implications of the Division of Knowledge for Innovation in Networks.- IV: Impacts.- 9. Organizational Requirements for the Innovation of Complex Technologies.- 10. Complex Systems and Collective Adoption: The Role of Networks and Partnerships as an Endogenous Mechanism to Reduce Dynamic Transaction Costs in the Context of Systemic Innovations.- 11. Industry Life-Cycle, Knowledge Generation and Technological Networks.- 12. Networks in the Knowledge Economy Restructuring Value Chains: Impacts of the Internet.- 13. Toward the Capture of Innovation Potentiality in Social Environments.- 14. Policy Networks in Adaptive Innovation Systems.- IV: Conclusion.- 15. Conclusion.- Notes.