The adoption of innovative asphalt equipment in road construction

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide insight into the adoption process of innovative asphalt equipment in road construction and how the level of knowledge as characterised by the level of education in the companies affects this process. The emphasis is on equipment used for transporting asphalt from asphalt plant to construction site or at the construction site itself. It is assumed that the uptake of this equipment is influenced by the radicality of the innovation and the company's level of education. Design/methodology/approach – In this research, the innovation behaviour of construction companies is assessed through a case study, an expert opinion, and an industry survey (of which 55 per cent of the total population participated). Findings – The results show that on average, experts and companies alike give more radical equipment innovations less adoption chances. Companies prefer to make minor improvements and perceive no benefits in implementing a risky radical equipment innovation. Companies that have a higher level of knowledge are found to show a more positive and professional attitude towards implementing innovative asphalt equipment. Research limitations/implications – The defined knowledge is restricted to the formal level of education of both management and the firm in one part of the construction industry. The knowledge indicator used in this study has a high validity (it is easy to measure). Further research could focus on other types of knowledge affecting innovation adoption in other parts of the construction industry. Originality/value – The value of this study is that it addresses the important questions of how managers of construction firms select equipment and how it is affected by the level of knowledg

Complementors and Innovation

A lot of innovations arise not from any single individual or single organization but instead of collaborative efforts of multiple individuals or organizations. This often faces difficult decisions and might result in losing (partly) control over core processes, the lost of know-how, and shared rewards. At the other hand collaboration creates opportunities that enable learning, more scale, faster development times and shared risks (Gulati, 1998; Gulati, Nohria, & Zaheer, 2000; Powell, Koput, & Smith-Doerr, 1996). The increasing amount of research in business relationships is able to emphasize the contribution to innovation and is argued in several themes

Complementors: their effects on new value creation by SMEs in the Dutch printing industry

New value creation by SMEs (Small and Medium Sized Enterprises) is often the result of collaborative efforts. Collaborations with complementors - firms that independently provide complementary products or services directly to mutual customers like coffee and coffee machines, hardware and software or cars and petrol stations - contribute significantly to new value creation, but are underexplored in current research. This dissertation delves into the role that complementor relationships play in the creation of new value and takes the commoditised Dutch printing industry as the empirical field. Starting from an economic, capabilities and marketing perspective, I explore the management literature on the expected role of complementors and complementarity in the new value creation process and argue that it is of particular interest to disentangle complementors and suppliers, and relate them to firm innovation performance. Then, by drawing on a case study from the Dutch printing industry and using the literature of social cognitive embedding, I am able to formulate hypotheses. These are tested in the quantitative section, with an 18% response rate. The results show that, as with suppliers, complementors are key relationships for successful innovation. However, both complementors and suppliers can have negative as well as positive impacts on a firm’s innovation performance and each has a stronger impact on certain aspects of performance. I thus conclude that complementor relationships are a valuable resource for Dutch printing firms in fighting the problem of commoditisation, though managers first need clarity on what specific aspect of innovation needs to be improved. Suggestions for further research are to develop a uniform holistic model of the external relationships a firm can have and preferably test it in other empirical settings