Le rôle des ressources dans la dépendance du pivot au sein de réseaux d'innovation

Abstract

Firms are collaborating with other organizations for resources and competences they lack internally. For SMEs, it is very difficult to complete alone an innovation project. The implementation of interorganizational networks enables the SME to exploit its invention by putting the innovation on the market. While some research has examined the link between resources and dependence, this article does so by examining the dynamic evolution of the hub firm dependence within innovation networks. The main objective is to understand the influence of resources and competences necessary for the project on the hub firm's degree of dependence. A longitudinal qualitative empirical study was conducted on six cases innovation networks driven by SMEs. Our results show that the hub firm's dependence evolves according to the resources and competences needed by the hub firm, which depend on the stage of the project. © 2010 Lavoisier, Paris.