Scope and patterns of innovation cooperation in Spanish service enterprises

Examining 2148 innovating service firms from the Spanish Technological Innovation Panel 2004, this paper utilizes Latent Class Analysis to appraise the scope of innovation cooperation in services in the Spanish economy, in accordance with the growing weight of external information flows throughout innovation processes. The empirical evidence indicates that the nature of the service activity affects both the partner chosen and the cooperation intensity. The results lead to the creation of a typology of cooperation composed of three broad profiles: service firms intensive in techno-scientific cooperation, intensive in interactions with clients and a profile with low intensity in cooperation, called lonely innovators. The probability that a firm belongs to the latter profile is 59%, which makes it reasonable to affirm that innovation cooperation is not a common practice in Spanish innovating service enterprises. Innovation output variables have been included in order to examine the relationship between patterns of cooperation and innovation performance. The findings also underline the co-existence of different cooperation patterns within the same industry.

► This article appraises the scope of innovation cooperation in Spanish service enterprises.
► Based on Latent Class Analysis, we created a typology composed of three broad profiles.
► Results suggest that cooperation on innovation is still not a very common practice in Spanish services.
► The nature of the service activity affects both the partner chosen and the cooperation intensity.
► The findings underline the co-existence of different cooperation pattern within the same industry.