Use of internal and external sources of knowledge and innovation in the Canadian wine industry

• Date: 01 June 2015
• Author: David Doloreux
• Published date: 01 June 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/cjas.1312

Use of internal and external sources of knowledge

and innovation in the Canadian wine industry

David Doloreux*

University of Ottawa and KEDGE Business School

Abstract

Using a sample of 146 Canadian wine-producing f‌irms, I

analyze the link between knowledge sources and innovation

by examining the way in which different strategies inf‌luence

af‌irm’s capacity for innovation. I then examine which inno-

vation strategies are more strongly linked to innovation and

the extent to which there are differences amongst wine-

producing regions in Canada. Copyright © 2015 ASAC.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Keywords: internal and external sources of knowledge,

innovation, wine-making industry, Canada

Résumé

La recherche a été conduite sur un échantillon de 146

entreprises canadiennes de l’industrie viticole. J’analyse le

lien entre l’utilisation de sources de connaissance et

l’innovation en examinant la manière dont différentes strat-

égies inf‌luencent la capacité d’innovation des entreprises

viticoles. Par la suite, j’examine les stratégies d’innovation

qui sont les plus fortement associées à l’innovation et

les différences au sein des régions viticoles canadiennes.

Copyright © 2015 ASAC. Published by John Wiley &

Sons, Ltd.

Mots-clés : sources de connaissance internes et externes,

innovation, industrie viticole, Canada

Innovation is the result of new knowledge obtained

through cumulative and changing processes of various uses

of internal and external knowledge in the f‌irm (Edquist,

2005; Kline & Rosenberg, 1986; Laursen & Salter, 2006;

Lundvall, 2007). In this paper, I examine the association

between the use of different internal and external knowledge

sources and the innovation performance of f‌irms. One key

question to investigate is whether a f‌irm’s innovation is more

eff‌icient by sharing and using knowledge with external part-

ners, or by keeping the process internally within the f‌irm.

Some studies show that the use of external knowledge

sources is important to a f‌irm’s capacity to innovate

(Chesborough, Vanhaverbeke, & West, 2006; Lazzarotti &

Manzini, 2009). For these authors, the success of innovation

is linked to the use of heterogeneous knowledge sources,

which provide multiple learning opportunities that a f‌irm can

exploit towardsinnovation. Other studies emphasize the inf‌lu-

ence of internal capacities and resources on a f‌irm’s ability to

innovate (Becheikh, Landry, & Amara, 2006; Freel, 2003).

Finally, some studies show that the acquisition of internal

and external knowledge may be complimentary activities in

the f‌irm’s innovation strategy (Doloreux & Shearmur, 2013;

Vega-Jurado, Gutierrez-Garcia, & Fernandez-de-Lucio, 2009).

This study examines the link between knowledge

sources and innovation, and the potential complementarity

between internal and external knowledge sources. In doing

so, I explore different strategies with respect to the use of

knowledge that inf‌luence the capacity for innovation in the

Canadian wine-making sector. The main contribution of this

study is to provide empirical results on the innovation pro-

cess from an industry which, until now, has received little

attention despite being characterized as highly innovative

(Doloreux & Lord-Tarte, 2014; Giuliani, Morrison, &

Rabellotti, 2011). The results not only provide a better

understanding of the diversity of sector-specif‌ic conditions

for innovation, they also suggest the possible combination

of the various internal and external activities linked to

innovation.

I identify innovation strategies using f‌irm-level informa-

tion. As a f‌irst step, I note the strategies related to the use of

various knowledge sources—internal or external—used by

f‌irms. I then analyze the strategies that are most strongly as-

sociated with innovation outputs. Finally, I examine whether

the strategies previously def‌ined differ amongst the different

wine-making regions of Canada. Within the context of this

study, an innovation strategy is def‌ined as choices made by

This article was submitted and reviewed in French and translated after

acceptance.

*Please address correspondence to: David Doloreux, Telfer School of Man-

agement, University of Ottawa, 55 Laurier East, Ottawa, ON, K1N 6N5

Canada. Email: Doloreux@telfer.uottawa.ca

Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences

Revue canadienne des sciences de l’administration

32: 102–112 (2015)

Published online 30 April 2015 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/CJAS.1312

Can J Adm Sci

32(2), 102–112 (2015)Copyright © 2015 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 102