Patrones tecnológicos y competitividad: un análisis de las empresas innovadoras en el País Vasco

In this work a study is made of the relationship between the various forms adopted by technological strategies in companies and in their competitiveness. With this purpose, starting from of the results of the ESTE - Eusko Ikaskuntza Survey on innovative companies in the Basque Country, a typology of the innovation standards to which such strategies correspond is made by means of the application of a cluster analysis. Such typology, which shows six different types of corporate behaviors, joins elements like the bases of knowledge, the financial and human resources assigned to technological activities, the direction of the innovative strategies, external cooperation and forms of technology appropriation. Thereinafter, the article examines three different indicators of competitiveness for each of those types of companies. The self-evaluation that companies do about their position with respect to their rivals is considered, as well as the place that the company occupies in the hierarchy of existing competitors in the market in which they operate and the competitive advantages that are expressed in the accomplishment of international activities. Of these indicators, the first two are not at all related with the standard of innovation. On the other hand, the indicators that refer to internationalization do reflect certain meaningful differences between groups of companies, although they seem more influenced by the size of the companies than by their technological characteristics. In fact, in the micro-economic area, the relationship between technology and competitiveness turns out to be a complex affair that cannot be reduced to a mere linear relationship.