research@hec - Issue #12 - (Page V)

Learning from Imitators Key Ideas from innovators’ research efforts. • Nevertheless, imitators do not reproduce innovations exactly, and they can add to the innovator’s knowledge in return. • The more widely innovation is spread, the more it contributes to Increase Your Technological Advantage • The knowledge of innovators inevitably spreads. Imitators thus benefit to innovators’ own knowledge and to their overall innovation capacity. M EXPERIMENTAL AND HEURISTIC KNOWLEDGE: BENEFICIAL COMPLEMENTARITY An innovation benefits not only its originator, but also its imitators. The spread of innovators’ knowledge to imitators (“knowledge spillover”) is inevitable, because knowledge is partly a public good. According to the two authors, the creation of new knowledge comes about either following a new combination of existing pieces of knowledge, or as a result of their reconfiguration. The process of innovation is experimental when innovators use their knowledge and try to alter each piece of it successively in order to observe the results and to draw conclusions from it. This can lead to a certain short-sightedness, related to ignorance of the efforts and advances made by other companies. This means running the risk, in the medium term, of being confined to incremental advances or sub-optimal solutions. The solution for optimizing the innovation process is to integrate external knowledge, which remains uncertain and costly. But reducing the costs and uncertainties associated with using external knowledge is possible if the process is heuristic: learning indirectly from others by observing their behavior and their results, and reproducing whatever works. This happens when researchers evaluate external knowledge and then integrate it into their own research—a filter before moving on to the experimental stage. Certain business models, such as those which integrate open source software, attempt to reconcile profit generation with rapid innovation. OBSERVING THE SOCIAL APPROPRIATION OF INNOVATION Efforts at innovation, including those incorporated into routines, thus serve as models for other companies (imitators) and to society as a whole. Access to others’ knowledge depends on geographical proximity, the nature of their research efforts, and their sectorial proximity. The manner of appropriation of this knowledge thus creates a knowledge base specific to each company. Social networks, technical publications, conferences, patent applications and attempts at reverse engineering can Corey Phelps BIOGRAPHY Corey Phelps is associate professor of strategy and business policy at HEC Paris. Previously he was assistant professor and the Neal & Jan Dempsey Faculty Fellow in the Management and Organization Department at the University of Washington. His research focuses on strategic alliances between companies, mergers and acquisitions, and investments in minority holdings of startups. December 2009-January 2010 • research@hec V

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of research@hec - Issue #12

Cover & Contents
HEC Center for Research on Individuals and Organizations
Government vs. Technology: Trustworthiness and E-Government
Learning from Imitators to Increase Your Technological Advantage
Measuring the Performance of Households’ Investments

research@hec - Issue #12