IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wzb/wzebiv/fsiv00-18.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Complementarities in Innovation Policy

Author

Listed:
  • Pierre Mohnen
  • Lars-Hendrik Röller

Abstract

This paper develops a framework for testing discrete complementarities in innovation policy using European data on obstacles to innovation. We propose a discrete test of supermodularity in innovation policy leading to a number of inequality constraints. We apply our test to two types of innovation decisions: to innovate or not, and if so, by how much. We find that industries display a considerable amount of complementarity, with some industries being complementary across all obstacles. We also find that the lack internal human capital (skilled personnel) is complementary to all the other obstacles in almost all industries. In this sense, our results suggest that internal human capital is key for any innovation policy, insofar that it is complementary to all the other factors that might hamper innovation activities. ZUSAMMENFASSUNG - (Innovationspolitik als komplementäres System) In diesem Beitrag wird die Innovationsfähigkeit von Unternehmen in Abhängigkeit von Standortfaktoren - wie etwa die Bereitstellung von Risikokapital, staatliche Regulierungen, und qualifizierte Mitarbeiter - als komplementäres System modelliert. Es wird aufgezeigt, wie die neue Komplementaritätstheorie in der empirischen Innovationsforschung angewandt werden kann, indem die Innovationsfunktion von Unternehmen auf die Eigenschaft der Supermodularität hin überprüft wird. Unter Berücksichtigung dieses Ansatzes wird, anhand von Innovationsdaten aus der CIS Datenbank, die Komplementaritätshypothese für eine Reihe von Industrien und Länder untersucht. Die Ergebnisse zeigen auf, daß viele Branchen von einem beträchtlichen Maße an Komplementarität gekennzeichnet sind. Damit bestätigen die Befunde, daß Innovationen, in bestimmten Branchen, ein koordiniertes Handeln der unter­schiedlichen Standortfaktoren voraussetzt. Als höchst komplementär zu allen anderen Stand­ortfaktoren in fast allen Industriezweigen erweist sich der Mangel an qualifiziertem Human­kapital. In diesem Sinne bekräftigen unsere Ergebnisse die These, daß Humankapital der Schlüssel für jede Innovationspolitik ist, insbesondere aufgrund der komplementären Beziehung zu allen anderen Faktoren.

Suggested Citation

  • Pierre Mohnen & Lars-Hendrik Röller, 2000. "Complementarities in Innovation Policy," CIG Working Papers FS IV 00-18, Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin (WZB), Research Unit: Competition and Innovation (CIG).
    • Handle: RePEc:wzb:wzebiv:fsiv00-18
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://skylla.wz-berlin.de/pdf/2000/iv00-18.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Eugenio J. Miravete & José C. Pernías, 2006. "Innovation Complementarity And Scale Of Production," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(1), pages 1-29, March.
    2. North, Douglass C, 1994. "Economic Performance through Time," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(3), pages 359-368, June.
    3. Arora, Ashish, 1996. "Testing for complementarities in reduced-form regressions: A note," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 51-55, January.
    4. Susan Athey & Scott Stern, 1998. "An Empirical Framework for Testing Theories About Complimentarity in Organizational Design," NBER Working Papers 6600, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Milgrom, Paul & Shannon, Chris, 1994. "Monotone Comparative Statics," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 62(1), pages 157-180, January.
    6. Milgrom, Paul & Roberts, John, 1994. "Complementarities and systems: Understanding japanese economic organization," Estudios Económicos, El Colegio de México, Centro de Estudios Económicos, vol. 9(1), pages 3-42.
    7. Athey, Susan. & Stern, Scott, 1969-, 1998. "An empirical framework for testing theories about complementarity in orgaziational design," Working papers WP 4022-98., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management.
    8. Veugelers, Reinhilde & Cassiman, Bruno, 2002. "Complementarity in the Innovation Strategy: Internal R&D, External Technology Acquisition and Cooperation," CEPR Discussion Papers 3284, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    9. Jacques Mairesse & Pierre Mohnen, 2001. "To Be or Not To Be Innovative: An Exercise in Measurement," NBER Working Papers 8644, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Giovanni Dosi, 2000. "Sources, Procedures, and Microeconomic Effects of Innovation," Chapters, in: Innovation, Organization and Economic Dynamics, chapter 2, pages 63-114, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    11. Ichniowski, Casey & Shaw, Kathryn & Prennushi, Giovanna, 1997. "The Effects of Human Resource Management Practices on Productivity: A Study of Steel Finishing Lines," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(3), pages 291-313, June.
    12. Vives, Xavier, 1990. "Nash equilibrium with strategic complementarities," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(3), pages 305-321.
    13. Holmstrom, Bengt & Milgrom, Paul, 1994. "The Firm as an Incentive System," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(4), pages 972-991, September.
    14. Kodde, David A & Palm, Franz C, 1986. "Wald Criteria for Jointly Testing Equality and Inequality Restriction s," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(5), pages 1243-1248, September.
    15. Milgrom, Paul & Roberts, John, 1990. "The Economics of Modern Manufacturing: Technology, Strategy, and Organization," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(3), pages 511-528, June.
    16. Cassiman, Bruno & Veugelers, Reinhilde, 2002. "Complementarity in the innovation strategy: Internal R&D, external technology acquisition, and cooperation in R&D," IESE Research Papers D/457, IESE Business School.
    17. Arora, Ashish & Gambardella, Alfonso, 1990. "Complementarity and External Linkages: The Strategies of the Large Firms in Biotechnology," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(4), pages 361-379, June.
    18. Donald M. Topkis, 1978. "Minimizing a Submodular Function on a Lattice," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 26(2), pages 305-321, April.
    19. Richard C. Levin & Alvin K. Klevorick & Richard R. Nelson & Sidney G. Winter, 1988. "Appropriating the Returns from Industrial R&D," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 862, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    20. Mariano,Roberto & Schuermann,Til & Weeks,Melvyn J. (ed.), 2000. "Simulation-based Inference in Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521591126.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Resende, Marcelo & Strube, Eduardo & Zeidan, Rodrigo, 2014. "Complementarity of innovation policies in Brazilian industry: An econometric study," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 9-17.
    2. Hottenrott, Hanna & Rexhäuser, Sascha & Veugelers, Reinhilde, 2016. "Organisational change and the productivity effects of green technology adoption," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 172-194.
    3. Hottenrott, Hanna & Rexhäuser, Sascha & Veugelers, Reinhilde, 2012. "Green innovations and organizational change: Making better use of environmental technology," ZEW Discussion Papers 12-043, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    4. Martin Carree & Boris Lokshin & René Belderbos, 2011. "A note on testing for complementarity and substitutability in the case of multiple practices," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 35(3), pages 263-269, June.
    5. Mazzanti, Massimiliano & Mancinelli, Susanna, 2007. "SME Performance, Innovation and Networking Evidence on Complementarities for a Local Economic System," Knowledge, Technology, Human Capital Working Papers 9554, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM).
    6. Gilli, Marianna & Mancinelli, Susanna & Mazzanti, Massimiliano, 2014. "Innovation complementarity and environmental productivity effects: Reality or delusion? Evidence from the EU," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 56-67.
    7. Goodhue, Rachael E. & Rausser, Gordon C., 2003. "Value Differentiation," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 28(3), pages 1-21, December.
    8. Zand, Fardad & Van Beers, Cees & Van Leeuwen, George, 2011. "Information technology, organizational change and firm productivity: A panel study of complementarity effects and clustering patterns in Manufacturing and Services," MPRA Paper 46469, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. repec:ipg:wpaper:2014-488 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Johannes Van Biesebroeck, 2007. "Complementarities in automobile production," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(7), pages 1315-1345.
    11. Milgrom, Paul & Roberts, John, 1995. "Complementarities and fit strategy, structure, and organizational change in manufacturing," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2-3), pages 179-208, April.
    12. Galia, Fabrice & Legros, Diego, 2004. "Complementarities between obstacles to innovation: evidence from France," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(8), pages 1185-1199, October.
    13. Caroline Mothe & Uyen T. Nguyen-Thi & Phu Nguyen-Van, 2015. "Assessing complementarity in organizational innovations for technological innovation: the role of knowledge management practices," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(29), pages 3040-3058, June.
    14. Hideshi Itoh & Tatsuya Kikutani & Osamu Hayashida, 2008. "Complementarities among Authority, Accountability, and Monitoring: Evidence from Japanese Business Groups," NBER Chapters, in: Organizational Innovation and Firm Performance, pages 207-228, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Caroline Mothe & Uyen T. Nguyen-Thi & Phu Nguyen-Van, 2014. "Are organizational innovation practices complements or substitutes for technological innovation performance?," Working Papers of BETA 2014-12, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    16. Leiponen, Aija, 2005. "Skills and innovation," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 23(5-6), pages 303-323, June.
    17. Leiponen, Aija, . "Essays in the Economics of Knowledge: Innovation, Collaboration, and Organizational Complementarities," ETLA A, The Research Institute of the Finnish Economy, number 31, June.
    18. Cassiman, Bruno & Veugelers, Reinhilde, 2002. "Complementarity in the innovation strategy: Internal R&D, external technology acquisition, and cooperation in R&D," IESE Research Papers D/457, IESE Business School.
    19. Veugelers, Reinhilde & Cassiman, Bruno, 2002. "Complementarity in the Innovation Strategy: Internal R&D, External Technology Acquisition and Cooperation," CEPR Discussion Papers 3284, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    20. An, Henry, 2012. "Complementarities in Production Technologies: An Empirical Analysis of the Dairy Industry," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 124653, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    21. Susan Athey & Scott Stern, 1998. "An Empirical Framework for Testing Theories About Complimentarity in Organizational Design," NBER Working Papers 6600, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • L5 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • O38 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Government Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wzb:wzebiv:fsiv00-18. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Jennifer Rontganger (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cicwzde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.