Systematic Development of Generic Skills to Enhance Innovation Capacity of Eastern and Southeastern European Universities

The level of innovativeness within the higher education systems of east and southeast Europe and their graduates is still assessed as modest or moderate. Besides the general socio–economic context and the inherited institutional management types, this deficiency stems from a lack of generic skills crucial for increasing the innovation capacity of the universities. TrainESEE v.2 project suggests that significant changes should be already put in place within the applied teaching methodology, but also highlights the importance of developing project development and management skills, innovation, entrepreneurial skills, and finally competences needed to strengthen science to business cooperation.

Is Home-Host Cultural Distance a Risk? Evidence from Outward Foreign Direct Investment by Chinese Enterprises

Cultural distance is always regarded as a “risk” in the decision making of enterprises involved in the outward foreign direct investment (OFDI), however, investment is a powerful driver of productivity growth and increased innovation capacity of enterprises in both countries. Is cultural distance a “risk” ? Using Hofstede's indicators and the Kogut and Singh index (1988), this paper calculates the cultural distance based on six cultural dimensions and further examines the effect of cultural distance on the outward foreign direct investment by Chinese enterprises and its mediating effects on the role of other factors influencing the decisions of multinationals. The results indicate that there is a nonlinear effect of cultural distance and the mediating effect of cultural distance is negative.

АНАЛІЗ КОНКУРЕНТОСПРОМОЖНОСТІ МАЛИХ ПІДПРИЄМСТВ НА ПРИКЛАДІ ТОВ «МЕДІГРАН»

The article is an attempt to provide argument towards the need to rethink changes in the management framework of a business entity associated primarily with modern manifestations of competition and the lack of an effective competitive environment, as well as weak competitive edge and poor innovation capacity. Based on the Medigran company, the study explores key stages of competitiveness development in small businesses along with suggesting the following successive development phases: basic financial planning, forecast-based planning, planning focused on the external environment, strategic management, company internal monitoring. The hypothesis of the study is to offer insights and evaluate competitiveness development stages as well as efforts to its enhancing subject to the external and internal environment specifics. The purpose of the study is to explore the nature and assess the Medigran competitiveness, and to identify its core advantages to gain the company competitiveness in modern business settings. An in-depth analysis of management practices has enabled to identify an effective tool to manage the Medigran’s competitiveness based on the use of a situational approach. It is argued that successful implementation of administrative technologies in the context of strategic management of the company competitiveness, sales boosting policies, developing technical support, and creating competitive advantages will ultimately provide a synergistic effect. The findings demonstrate that to gain sustainable competitive advantages, it is critical to identify their priority sources, create promising opportunities, add value and build new fundamental competencies, as well as employ benchmarking, overcome organizational inertia, timely detect and update outdated knowledge, skills and processes.

R&D tax incentives and innovation: unveiling the mechanisms behind innovation capacity

PurposeThere is a scarcity of empirical evidence in the literature on the chain of causality involving tax incentives for Research and Development (R&D) activities and their subsequent transformation into innovation. This study aims to assess the influence of R&D tax incentives on the organizational attributes of Portuguese firms to identify how they are converted into innovation.Design/methodology/approachA structural research model consisting of 339 companies that benefited from the Fiscal Incentive System supporting R&D in Enterprises, during the period from 2013 to 2016, was developed. This was done to assess the role of R&D tax incentives on the organizational attributes that form the innovation capacity. The model was validated using the multivariate statistical technique of structural equation modeling with partial least squares estimation (partial least squares structural equation modeling – PLS-SEM).FindingsThe results found suggest that although it is not possible to unequivocally identify the mechanisms used to convert tax incentives into innovation, it is possible to conclude that they play an important spillover effect for the construction and strengthening of organizational attributes. These form the basis of innovation capacity, to the extent that they positively influence the firms’ total assets, equity, liabilities, number of employees and sales. Hence, contributions are brought to both the literature on tax incentives and the general literature on innovation.Originality/valueFor policymakers, the evidence points to the fact that in addition to the incentives provided, novel mechanisms need to be established to help firms develop their absorptive capacity. The objective is to effectively convert the incentives received into innovation through the organizational attributes analyzed. From the firms’ point of view, the results found suggest that tax incentives act as a catalyst for making R&D investments. Additionally, there is an influence on employability, which effectively enhances the chances of innovation in the long run. Tax incentives received by Portuguese firms also have the effect of promoting economic dynamism – by enhancing the following: investments in infrastructure, the hiring of employees and the increasing of sales, generating positive externalities for both firms and society.

Enhancing Employee Innovative Work Behavior Through Human Resource Management Practices

Innovation capacity is one of the essential elements that ensure sustainability of the organizations. Organizations need to be creative and innovative so as to put products and services to market by forecasting customer needs to get competitive advantage in a rapidly changing business environment. Businesses that are more pioneering in innovation will be more successful if they can respond to changing environmental conditions and develop new capabilities that will allow them to deliver better performance. Innovation helps businesses to reduce costs, improve performance, and create new products and services to increase their competitiveness. Scholars contend that the development and implementation of human resource management is critical to benefit such essential employee contributions.

Spatial Patterns of Urban Innovation and Their Evolution from Perspectives of Capacity and Structure: Taking Shenzhen as an Example

Innovation is a key factor for a country’s overall national strength and core competitiveness. The spatial pattern of innovation reflects the regional differences of innovation development, which can provide guidance for the regional allocation of innovation resources. Most studies on the spatial pattern of innovation are at urban and above spatial scale, but studies at urban internal scale are insufficient. The precision and index of the spatial pattern of innovation in the city needs to be improved. This study proposes to divide spatial units based on geographic coordinates of patents, designs the innovation capability and innovation structure index of a spatial unit and their calculation methods, and then reveals the spatial patterns of innovation and their evolutionary characteristics in Shenzhen during 2000–2018. The results show that: (1) The pattern of innovation capacity of secondary industry exhibited a pronounced spatial spillover effect with a positive spatial correlation. The innovation capacity and innovation structure index of the secondary industry evolved in a similar manner; i.e., they gradually extended from the southwest area to the north over time, forming a tree-like distribution pattern with the central part of the southwest area as the “root” and the northwest and northeast areas as the “canopy”. (2) The pattern of innovation capacity of tertiary industry also had a significant spatial spillover effect with a positive spatial correlation. There were differences between the evolutions of innovation capacity and innovation structure index of tertiary industry. Specifically, its innovation capacity presented a triangular spatial distribution pattern with three groups in the central and eastern parts of the southwest area and the south-eastern part of the northwest area as the vertices, while its innovative structure showed a radial spatial distribution pattern with the southwestern part of the southwest area as the source and a gradually sparse distribution toward the northeast. (3) There were differences between the evolution modes of secondary and tertiary industries. Areas with high innovation capacity in the secondary industry tended to be more balanced, while areas with high innovation capacity in the tertiary industry did not necessarily have a balanced innovation structure. Through the method designed in this paper, the spatial pattern of urban innovation can be more precise and comprehensive revealed, and provide useful references for the development of urban innovation.

Research of the Influence of the Innovations of the Business Models on the Economic Results of the Enterprises

An expanding amount of research and a growing number of scientific publications are devoted to the problems of business model innovations, given their increased theoretical and practical significance. However, this concept is not well developed. There are very few publications in Bulgaria dedicated to the theory of business models and in particular to their innovation. A study of the processes of innovation of business models in Bulgarian enterprises, including their activity and the actual results achieved by their implementation, has not yet been made. In view of this, the purpose of this article is to briefly present the results of a study of the effects of business model innovation, conducted in a sample of Bulgarian enterprises, as well as to clarify their impact on the economic results of enterprises. The results of the empirical study demonstrate the impact of the innovation capacity of enterprises on the level of economic results achieved through these innovations. The main hypotheses of the study are: 1. Firms that innovate their business models achieve higher economic results than the average level of results for the respective industries. 2. The positive impact of business model innovations on the economic results of enterprises is stronger than the impact of individual innovations of another kind. 3. The economic results of the conducted innovations of the business models are higher in the industries with high innovation capacity than in the industries with low capacity. 4. The economic results of the conducted innovations of the business models are higher in the big enterprises than in the small and medium enterprises with lower innovation capacity. The authors hope that this article would provoke a discussion on these and other similar issues related to this topic. The results would assist future research as well as business leaders in making management decisions in developing strategies. The paper is organized as follows: Section 1 is a introduction and a overview of relevant literature, Section 2 explains the methodology, Section 3 presents the results of the empirical study and a discussion of the results and Section 4 contains the conclusion.