Breaking the dilemma between robustness and generativeness: a comparative experiment on the use of new design software at the design-gap: A Comparative Experiment on the use of New Design Software at the Design-Gap

International audienceAre creative designers doomed to loose in creativity when integrated in NPD processes? While a lot of studies point the necessity to achieve both creativity and feasibility, it remains hard to make more than a frustrating trade off. Still a new generation of design software have recently been proposed to better integrate industrial designers in engineering design processes. Based on a comparative experiment, we show that some of these tools enable to break the dilemma between creativity and robustness. Focusing on the design gap, a sample of 6 industrial designers was asked to design from a handmade rough sketch a 3D-digital object integrated in a CAD software suite. We compare the performance in term of gain or loss of originality and robustness (measured by 5 independent experts) between the uses of two representative digital design tools. It appears that the use of one of the software significantly increased simultaneously to Generativeness and Robustness of a design. It confirms that it is possible to ground creativity on constraint and show the possibility of new design processes characterized by their capacity to avoid loss in Originality and to improve what we call an "acquired creativity" all along the design process

Secrecy versus patents: process innovations and the role of uncertainty

Whilst firms often prefer secrecy to patents and process innovations particu- larly lend themselves to secrecy, we establish a rationale for process innovators who patent. Using a simple two-period model, we show that under myopic op- timisation, the incentive to patent rather than pursue secrecy increases as the probability that the rival firm attaches to it being low-cost falls and as the pro- portion of the cost reduction due to the innovation, secured by the rival firm in the period after the patent has expired, falls. However, the gain to the innovating firm from patenting rather than secrecy strictly increases if the cost reduction due to the innovation is sufficiently small that the high-cost firm could profitably bluff that it is low-cost. Finally, allowing the low-cost firm the option of using an output signal in such cases, may make the patent strategy more or less attractive relative to the case of myopic optimisation

Robust methodology for investment climate assessment on productivity: application to investment climate surveys from Central America

Developing countries are increasingly concerned about improving country competitiveness and productivity, as they face the increasing pressures of globalization and attempt to improve economic growth and reduce poverty. Among such countries, Investment Climate Assessments (ICA) surveys at the firm level, have become the standard way for the World Bank to identify key obstacles to country competitiveness, in order to prioritize policy reforms for enhancing competitiveness. Given the surveys objectives and the nature and limitations of the data collected, this paper discusses the advantages and disadvantages of using different productivity measures. The main objective is to develop a methodology to estimate, in a consistent manner, the productivity impact of the investment climate variables. The paper applies it to the data collected for ICAs in four countries: Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. Observations on logarithms (logs) of the variables are pooled across three countries (Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua). Endogeneity of the production function inputs and of the investment climate variables is addressed by using a variant of the control function approach, based on individual firm information, and by aggregating investment climate variables by industry and region. It is shown that it is possible to get robust results for 10 different productivity measures. The estimates for the four countries show how relevant the investment climate variables are to explain the average level of productivity. IC variables in several categories (red tape, corruption and crime, infrastructure and, quality and innovation) account for over 30 percent of average productivity. The policy implications are clear: investment climate matters and the relative impact of the various investment climate variables indicate where reform efforts should be directed in each country. It is argued that this methodology can be used as a benchmark to assess productivity effects in other ICA surveys. This is important because ICA surveys are available now for more than 65 developing countries.Total factor productivity, Investment climate, Competitiveness, Firm level determinants of productivity, Robust productivity impacts,

A Process Approach to Corporate Coherence

We address the notion of 'corporate coherence', recently made prominent by Teece, Rumelt, Dosi and Winter (1994). We argue that the literature is confused on the meaning of the notion (and similar notions) in a number of dimensions. Drawing on insights from market-process theories, we put forward a dynamic understanding of corporate coherence as involving the corporate capacity to strike a favorable balance between the production and the exploitation of new knowledge. This argument is elaborated drawing on Austrian, evolutionary and post- Marshallian economics.Corporate coherence, knowledge, competences

Research on Markets for Inventions and Implications for R&D Allocation Strategies

Several streams of literature have examined the phenomenon of “markets for inventions”, that is, the trade of elements of knowledge which are “disembodied” from individuals, organizations, and products. The aims of this paper are to bring together the various streams of research in this area and discuss their major assumptions and limitations, in order to provide a comprehensive framework for understanding the phenomenon, and identify promising paths for future research. We start our review by identifying the object of market exchange—that is, an invention whose knowledge has been codified and disembodied from individuals, organizations, or artifacts. We then identify those factors that enable firms to trade inventions, distinguishing between institutional-, firm-, and industry-level factors. We close our analysis of the extant literature by discussing the implications of markets for inventions for firm behavior and performance. Against this background, we highlight an important avenue for future research. A neglected implication of the development of invention markets is that firms are confronted with a wide variety of technological paths from which to choose, because the opportunity to acquire technologies on the market offers them a greater variety that can their internal R&D departments. However, the streams of research on markets for inventions and on R&D allocation strategies have been surprisingly disconnected so far. Hence, in the final section, we start to establish and explore the link between these literatures, and to identify a research agenda in this domain

Product Development in the World Auto Industry

macroeconomics, auto industry, management efficiency, productivity

Target value design: using collaboration and a lean approach to reduce construction cost

Target Costing is an effective management technique that has been used in manufacturing for decades to achieve cost predictability during new products development. Adoption of this technique promises benefits for the construction industry as it struggles to raise the number of successful outcomes and certainty of project delivery in terms of cost, quality and time. Target Value Design is a management approach that takes the best features of Target Costing and adapts them to the peculiarities of construction. In this paper the concept of Target Value Design is introduced based on the results of action research carried out on 12 construction projects in the USA. It has been shown that systemic application of Target Value Design leads to significant improvement of project performance – the final cost of projects was on average 15% less than market cost. The construction industry already has approaches that have similarities with elements of the Target Value Design process or uses the same terminology, e.g. Partnering and Target Cost Contracts, Cost planning, etc. Following an exploration of the similarities and differences Target Value Design is positioned as a form of Target Costing for construction that offers a more reliable route to successful projects outcomes

Beyond the dyad : role of non-competitive partners in coopetitive R&D projects

Author's accepted manuscript (postprint).Electronic version of an article published as Smiljic, S. (2020). Beyond the dyad: role of non-competitive partners in coopetitive R&D projects. International Journal of Innovation Management. https://doi.org/10.1142/S136391962040006X. © 2020 World Scientific Publishing Company. https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscinet/ijim.Available from 22/10/2021.acceptedVersio