Cooperation-based innovators and peripheral cooperators: An empirical analysis of their characteristics and behavior

There are many controversies in the literature over the influence of different firm characteristics on the importance to the firm of cooperation for innovation. Empirical studies have focused on the fact of cooperation but have not measured its importance for the firm. The purpose of this work is to go a step further by investigating the characteristics and cooperative behaviour of firms that use cooperation as the main way to achieve innovation (cooperation-based innovators). We draw on the 2004 Spanish Innovation Survey and employ a two-step Heckman model. Our main results show that there are sharp differences among firms. More precisely, we find that smaller firms and firms outside the high-tech sectors are more likely to be cooperation-based innovators. We also find that the type of cooperative behaviour matters. Cooperation with providers, with a few agents and with national partners are strong features of cooperation-based innovators. We discuss some management and policy implications of our results.