Incremental and Radical Innovation in Coopetition—The Role of Absorptive Capacity and Appropriability

This study examines why some firms are better able than others to reap benefits from collaborating with their competitors in innovation. Whereas on the general level, collaborative innovation has been studied widely, and firm‐specific success factors in collaboration between competitors (i.e., coopetition) have not been exhaustively addressed. Earlier literature describes coopetition as a risky but potentially rewarding relationship in which sharing, learning, and protection of knowledge are recognized as the key issues determining the possible benefits and hazards. This study provides evidence of factors related to this, suggesting that the firm's ability to acquire knowledge from external sources (potential absorptive capacity) and to protect its innovations and core knowledge against imitation (appropriability regime) are relevant in increasing the innovation outcomes of collaborating with its competitors. This study also distinguishes between incremental and radical innovations as an outcome of coopetition, and provides differing implications for the two innovation types. The empirical evidence for the study was gathered from a cross‐industry survey conducted on Finnish markets. The data are analyzed with multivariate multiple regression analysis. The results of the analysis suggest that (1) potential absorptive capacity and appropriability regime of the firm both have a positive effect in the pursuit of incremental innovations in coopetition, and (2) in the case of radical innovations, appropriability regime has a positive effect, while the effect of absorptive capacity is not statistically significant. However, the results also indicate that there is a moderating relationship between these variables, in that the potential absorptive capacity is positively associated with creation of radical innovations within high levels of appropriability regime. These results yield important theoretical and managerial implications. As a whole, the results presented in this study provide new evidence on which types of firms can reap success in the challenging task of collaborative innovation with rivals. In the case of incremental innovation, a firm‐level emphasis on knowledge sharing and learning will positively affect the results of coopetition, as will an emphasis on knowledge protection. Thus, when incremental developments are pursued in coopetition, firms should not only seek to exchange knowledge to create value but also remember to secure the firm‐specific core knowledge within the firm's borders to stay competitive. On the other hand, when the firm is pursuing radical innovation with its rivals, the heaviest emphasis should be on protecting its existing core knowledge and also emerging novel innovations and market opportunities. Capabilities in knowledge acquisition are also beneficial in these cases, but the full benefits of knowledge exchange realize only when the firm's knowledge protection mechanisms are sufficiently strong, allowing for safe knowledge exchange between rivals.     

How Information Technology Assimilation Promotes Exploratory and Exploitative Innovation in the Small‐ and Medium‐Sized Firm Context: The Role of Contextual Ambidexterity and Knowledge Base

This research sheds new light on how information technology (IT) assimilation affects exploratory and exploitative innovation in the context of small‐ and medium‐sized firms (SMEs). This contextualization is important in establishing the boundary conditions for the theory, as well as generating specific managerial insights for SME managers. A sample of 248 U.K.‐based SMEs in the manufacturing industry demonstrates contextual ambidexterity (CA) mediates the relationship between IT assimilation and two types of innovation. This finding highlights that IT assimilation does not automatically promote innovation. Instead, IT assimilation represents a critical resource that enables the effective implementation of CA, which in turn affects innovation. This implies that SMEs cannot fully realize the potential of their IT assimilation and use it to enable innovation without implementing CA. Furthermore, this study differentiates between two different dimensions of knowledge base: knowledge breadth and knowledge depth. This study finds that knowledge breadth moderates the indirect IT assimilation–exploratory innovation relationship by influencing the effect of CA on exploratory innovation. Knowledge depth, on the other hand, moderates the indirect IT assimilation–exploitative innovation relationship by influencing the effect of CA on exploitative innovation. This finding implies that SMEs can benefit from their IT assimilation that enables them to engage in CA, which in turn allows them to perform innovation. However, it is apparent that the dimension of knowledge that SMEs hold internally can determine what types of innovation that they are able to perform.     

Whom Should We Talk to? Investigating the Varying Roles of Internal and External Relationship Quality on Radical and Incremental Innovation Performance

Research suggests that close relationships with internal and external partners are likely to have a significant impact on new product development (NPD). What is unclear is how the effects of internal and external relationships influence development paths for different types of innovations. Prior literature indicates that the pathways for developing incremental innovations differ considerably from those for radical innovations. Thus it is plausible that the effects of external versus internal relationships vary across these two innovation types. This paper uses the 2012 Comparative Performance Assessment Study (CPAS) data set to investigate the roles of internal and external relationship quality on the development of both incremental and radical innovations. The results find that internal and not external relationship quality is beneficial for the development of incremental innovations. When driven by internal relationships, a flexible NPD process is advantageous for the financial performance of incremental innovations. Meanwhile external and not internal relationship quality is valuable for developing radical innovations. External relationship quality results in process flexibility, leading to project execution success and subsequent financial performance for radical innovations. As expected, project execution success consistently leads to increased financial performance. These findings indicate the critical differences in types of relationship quality required when developing new products based on radical versus incremental innovations.     

Rethinking the ‘mirroring’ hypothesis: implications for technological modularity,tacit coordination,and radical innovation

Studies of the ‘mirroring’ hypothesis have demonstrated the relationships between technological modularity and explicit coordination, yet little is known about the ‘mirroring’ relationship between technological modularity and tacit coordination, and how the ‘mirroring’ relationship may affect radical innovation. This paper contributes to the ‘mirroring’ hypothesis by identifying the interaction mechanisms embedded in and surrounded over the mirroring relationships. Using survey data of 121 high-tech firms in China, our study indicates that technological modularity enhances interfirm tacit coordination between module-makers (‘mirroring’ hypothesis), and will also positively influence radical innovation (‘outcome’ hypothesis). Moreover, tacit coordination negatively moderates the impact of technological modularity on radical innovation (‘interaction’ hypothesis), indicating that the ‘mirroring’ relationship may offset the benefit obtained from modularization. It also suggests that, in a high-technology industry in underdeveloped areas, tacit coordination could lead to exposure of hidden knowledge, thus lowering module-makers' motivation for technology breakthrough.     

Repeating a familiar pattern in a new way: The effect of exploitation and exploration on knowledge leverage behaviors in technology acquisitions

Research Summary: We identify two types of knowledge leverage behaviors undertaken by acquiring firms: integrated and independent knowledge leverage. We address how the prior exploitation or exploration orientation of acquirers influence these two modes of knowledge leverage behaviors. The degree of exploitation of acquirers promotes integrating their existing knowledge with acquired knowledge in innovative actions. In contrast, the degree of exploration of acquirers increases the likelihood that new innovations will use acquired knowledge without integrating it with their prior knowledge. In addition, the firm's prior acquisition rate moderates the relationship between the acquiring firms’ previous exploitation or exploration orientation and their knowledge leverage mode. The findings of this article suggest that pre‐acquisition innovation capabilities are distinct from but influence the post‐acquisition innovation actions. Managerial Summary: Firms often undertake acquisitions to gain access to new knowledge, but they can differ dramatically in how they leverage acquired knowledge. We show that the firm's prior innovation patterns drive this choice. Firms that have previously focused on incremental innovations in their internal innovation efforts tend to integrate acquired knowledge with their own prior knowledge. In contrast, firms that have previously pursued bold innovations tend to leverage acquired knowledge alone in new innovations. Thus, we show that firms use acquisitions as a means to extend their internal innovation patterns—firms that have focused on incremental innovations extend that with acquisitions by linking new innovations to their prior knowledge while firms that have pursued bold initiatives use acquired knowledge to move in new technology directions.     

Explicit and tacit synergies between alliance firms and radical innovation: the moderating roles of interfirm technological diversity and environmental technological dynamism

This study draws on theories of organizational inertia and relational view to examine how the pursuit of partnership synergy influences radical innovation in different technological contexts. We differentiate between two types of synergy: explicit synergy, defined as the potential to exchange interfirm operational elements to renew processes or capabilities, and tacit synergy, conceptualized as the potential to synthesize cross-boundary resources to develop new perspectives or thinking modes. We find that both explicit and tacit synergies have positive impacts on radical innovation, and such impacts are contingent on interfirm technological diversity and environmental technological dynamism in opposing ways. Specifically, environmental technological dynamism positively moderates the relationship between explicit synergy and radical innovation but not the relationship between tacit synergy and radical innovation. In contrast, interfirm technological diversity positively moderates the relationship between tacit synergy and radical innovation but not the relationship between explicit synergy and radical innovation. Our study sheds new light on the generation of radical innovation in alliances. It also provides practitioners with useful guidelines for crafting synergy strategies that will facilitate the pursuit of radical innovation.     

Antecedents and consequence of organizational unlearning: Evidence from China

Radical innovation has significant impact on organizations. To develop radical innovation, firms need to change or discard their obsolete routines, beliefs, and knowledge, since radical innovation represents a clear departure from existing practices. Based on the organizational unlearning literature and contingency theory, the authors explore three issues: (1) the relationship between organizational unlearning and radical innovation; (2) two antecedents to organizational unlearning (environmental turbulence and entrepreneurial orientation); and (3) how firm size moderates the relationships between the antecedents and organizational unlearning. Survey data from 238 manufacturing firms in China indicated that both environmental turbulence and entrepreneurial orientation (EO) are positively related to organizational unlearning. Firm size plays a dual role, weakening the positive environmental turbulence−organizational unlearning relationship while strengthening the positive EO − organizational unlearning relationship. Further, organizational unlearning is found to be a critical driver of radical innovation.     

Customer interactivity and new product performance: Moderating effects of product newness and product embeddedness

Understanding customer needs which drive significant product innovation is particularly challenging for new product development (NPD) organizations. Research has addressed how organizations benefit from interacting with customers, but more conceptualization is needed into the dimensions of the customer interaction process. In a business-to-business (B2B) setting, customer interactivity is conceptualized as a multi-dimensional construct consisting of bidirectional communications, participation, and joint problem solving during NPD projects. Drawing upon organizational information processing theory, customer interactivity is hypothesized to be positively related to customer information quality when developing highly innovative products, but not when developing modifications or extensions of existing products. Another condition affecting this relationship studied is the embeddedness of the new product in the customer's business environment. Customer interactivity is hypothesized to be positively related to information quality for highly embedded product, but not for low embedded product. Results from a sample of NPD organizations in several B2B industries support these hypotheses. The study contributes to the marketing literature and practice by identifying important dimensions of the customer interaction process which lead to more proactive organizations, and identifying two moderating conditions of the customer interactivity and NPD performance relationship.     

Selecting Influential Business-to-Business Customers in New Product Development: Relational Embeddedness and Knowledge Heterogeneity Considerations

This study examines how the most influential business‐to‐business (B2B) customers, both existing and potential, involved in providing input to a new product development (NPD) project influence new product advantage. As the relational literature suggests, involving customers who have had close and embedded relationships with a firm's new product organization, such as a firm's largest customers, and customers who have been involved in past collaborative activities, should lead to the development of superior products. To the contrary, the innovation literature suggests that a firm may become too close to its large, embedded customers resulting in less innovation and in lower performing products. Also, the relationship between the heterogeneity of the knowledge of the most influential customers and new product advantage is examined. A contingency perspective is hypothesized such that the degree of product newness sought in the project moderates the effects of both relational embeddedness and knowledge heterogeneity on new product advantage. Empirical findings from a sample of 137 NPD projects support this contingency view. For projects seeking to develop incremental products, where the product being developed is an extension or an enhancement to an existing product, new product advantage tended to be higher in projects using embedded or homogeneous customers. For incremental projects, projects using less‐embedded or heterogeneous customers tended to have lower product performance. For projects following a highly innovative product strategy, new product advantage tended to be higher in projects that involved heterogeneous customers. These heterogeneous customers provided NPD projects with a diversity of perspectives, competencies, and experiences that fostered significant product innovations. The study contributes to the literature by empirically testing relational and innovation theories in NPD projects and by providing evidence on the importance of relational embeddedness and knowledge heterogeneity in selecting influential customers in NPD projects.     

Complements or Substitutes? Internal Technological Strength,Competitor Alliance Participation,and Innovation Development

While a firm can choose to develop an innovation internally or externally, the internal knowledge development and external knowledge acquisition tend to interact with each other in the innovation process. The present study examines whether internal technological strength and external competitor alliance participation serve as complements or substitutes in innovation development. Built on the knowledge‐based view, this study offers a contingency perspective on the nature of knowledge integration between internal technological strength and external alliance relationships, and how they jointly influence radical and incremental innovation differently. Adopting a random effect negative binomial model specification, a panel data set of 64 pharmaceutical firms over a 15‐year period were used to test the hypothesized effects. The findings indicate that internal technological knowledge strength has an inverted U‐shaped relationship with radical and incremental innovation. More importantly, the findings also demonstrate that the combined effect of internal and external sources of innovation can have differential effects on radical and incremental innovation development. Specifically, competitor alliance participation strengthens the effect of internal technological strength on incremental product innovation while it weakens the above effect on radical product innovation. This suggests that internal and external sources of innovation may complement each other for incremental innovation while they may represent trade‐offs for radical innovation development. The above findings provide empirical evidence for the complexity of pursuing organizational ambidexterity in innovation generation and highlight the importance of balancing the internal and external knowledge sources in pursuing innovation.     

Appropriability regime for radical and incremental innovations

In the present day markets, new product development and innovation are essential for value creation. Innovation, however, hardly provides benefits if rivals are able to copy it with little or no extra cost. Consequently, being able to build an appropriability regime that provides effective protection against imitation and enables getting returns on investments in innovation is necessary. The problem is that choosing the methods to protect different kinds of innovations is not straightforward. In this paper we study appropriating from radical and incremental innovations. It is widely known that many significant differences exist between the two innovation types, and the appropriability conditions are no exception. Empirical evidence on the topic is provided by analyzing survey data collected among 299 companies. As a result, the effects of environmental dynamism and research and development (R&D) intensity on radical and incremental innovation are illustrated, and knowledge is provided on the role of the appropriability regime in enhancing the potential to profit from radical and incremental innovations.     

Managing Intellectual Property in Global Outsourcing for Innovation Generation

The globalization of markets and business operations is a trend that will continue strongly in the coming decades. One inescapable aspect of globalization has been the trend toward global outsourcing, especially that of knowledge‐based services. Due to firms' compulsion to reduce costs in the developed world, the issue is not if a particular firm will outsource or offshore work but when it will outsource it and how effectively it will leverage outsourcing to achieve superior competitive advantage. An important implication of the outsourcing of knowledge‐based services is the management of intellectual property (IP). Managers and researchers alike are interested in understanding the effects of global outsourcing of knowledge‐based services on the management of IP. The challenge of accessing, exploiting, and defending IP in global outsourcing relationships is first examined in this paper. IP can be managed by balancing the trust and control and verification in the outsourcing relationship. Given that defending IP is a major concern for outsourcing firms, the moderating roles of multitier suppliers, supplier country legal regimes, and global supplier communities of practice on defending IP is examined in detail through moderating effect propositions. Finally, the paper examines the effect of accessing, defending, and exploiting IP in global outsourcing relationships on the generation of incremental and radical innovation for the outsourcing firm. This research tries to extend current academic research on global outsourcing in three ways. First, it offers a framework to understand the management of the buyer–seller relationship in the global outsourcing of knowledge‐based services and its relationship to the management of IP and innovation generation. Second, the framework takes a broader perspective of outsourcing and innovation generation, including globalization, tiered suppliers, supplier country legal regimes, and global supplier communities of practice on defending IP. Third the research examines the effect of accessing, exploitation, and defense of IP on generation of incremental and radical innovation for the outsourcing firm. Managerial implications of this research and future research directions are also discussed.     

Does Market Orientation Facilitate Balanced Innovation Programs? An Organizational Learning Perspective

There appears to be widespread agreement that optimal new product development programs require a balance between customer-led and lead-the-customer innovation practices. The former is associated with adaptive learning inspired incremental innovation, whereas the latter is associated with generative-learning-inspired radical innovation. There is debate, however, as to whether a strong market orientation can facilitate this balance. Some believe that a strong market orientation causes firms to overemphasize customer-led incremental innovations. Others believe that a strong market orientation can facilitate this balance but assert that traditional measures of market orientation only capture the types of behaviors associated with customer-led incremental innovations. This latter concern has led some to abandon the single-construct operationalization of market orientation and to introduce two constructs—responsive and proactive market orientation—into the literature. The purpose of this research is to address these developments. The study makes use of a national sample of marketing executives and employs a cross-sectional survey design. Measures used are market orientation, radical and incremental innovation priority, generative and adaptive learning priority, and new product success. Confirmatory factor analyses and structural equations models are employed to develop measures and to test hypotheses. The study's results reaffirm the position that a strong market orientation helps facilitate a balance between incremental and radical innovation by shifting firms' innovation priority more toward radical innovation activities. It also suggests that the abandonment of traditional conceptualizations and measures of market orientation are premature.     

知识螺旋影响研发团队创新创意产生实证研究——内部社会资本的调节效应

为了研究研发团队内部知识的交互对于创意产生的机理,通过构建概念模型,研究知识螺旋对研发团队创新创意产生的影响,并分析内部社会资本的调节效应。采用结构方程模型和分层线性分析,基于274份样本的实证研究表明:一方面,知识螺旋显著积极影响研发团队创新创意产生,并且知识表出化、知识结合化、知识内在化及知识社会化分别积极影响创新创意产生;另一方面,内部社会资本不同维度在知识螺旋与创新创意产生关系中的调节效应各不相同,结构社会资本的调节效应并不显著,而认知社会资本和关系社会资本显著正向调节知识螺旋对创新创意产生的影响。根据研究结果,提出促进研发团队创意产生的建议。     

When Does Customer Orientation Hinder (Help) Radical Product Innovation? The Role of Organizational Rewards

Prior marketing literature offers a compelling theoretical rationale in support of two contradictory propositions, namely, that customer orientation is negatively related to (i.e., hinders) radical product innovation and that customer orientation is positively related to (i.e., helps) radical product innovation. In this research, the contextual conditions that determine the validity of these contradictory propositions are identified. Drawing from the literature on organizational rewards, two types of organizational rewards—outcome based and strategy based—are identified as being the key contextual conditions. It is hypothesized that when outcome‐based rewards are in effect, customer orientation is negatively related to radical positive innovation and, that when strategy‐based rewards are in effect, customer orientation is positively related to radical product innovation. Results from a survey of 156 manufacturing firms, and from a survey of 97 of their customers, provide support for these hypotheses. While prior research has attempted to explain the contradictory nature of the relationship between customer orientation and radical product innovation using typology‐based and mediator‐based approaches, the contextual condition‐based approach has not been well developed. This gap is addressed by the present research. From a practitioner perspective, the research is important because it identifies a concrete mechanism that new product development managers can deploy, in tandem with customer orientation, if they intend to generate radical product innovations. Given the potential gains that flow from radical product innovation, the research findings are expected to be of considerable interest to managers of new product development projects.     

The Effects of Mainstream and Emerging Customer Orientations on Radical and Disruptive Innovations

The merits of being customer‐oriented for firm innovation have long been debated. Firms focused on their existing customers have been argued to be less innovative. This paper distinguishes between mainstream and emerging customer orientations and examines their effects on the introduction of disruptive and radical product innovations. Radical product innovations draw on a substantially new technology and could initially be targeted at a mainstream or an emerging market. In contrast, disruptive innovations are initially targeted at an emerging market, and may not involve the newest technology. This paper hypothesizes that mainstream customer orientation is negatively related to disruptive innovation and positively related to radical innovation, and that emerging customer orientation is positively related to disruptive innovation. To test these hypotheses, longitudinal and multiple informant data from senior executives in 128 SBUs of 19 Fortune 200 corporations are analyzed, with technology scanning and willingness to cannibalize as key control variables. The results support the hypotheses, providing evidence for contrasting effects of being oriented to mainstream customers and/or emerging customers on radical and disruptive innovations. Mainstream customer orientation has a positive impact on the introduction of radical innovations but a negative impact on disruptive innovation, while emerging customer orientation has a positive effect on disruptive innovation and is unrelated to radical innovations. Technology scanning is positively related to radical innovation but not to disruptive innovation, supporting the idea that disruptive innovation may not require new technology. In contrast, willingness to cannibalize is positively related to disruptive innovation but not to radical innovation, supporting the idea that radical innovation does not require cannibalization of existing investments. Additionally, mainstream customer orientation is found to have a near‐zero correlation with emerging customer orientation, indicating that the two can coexist and can be pursued simultaneously.     

When to Use Loose or Tight Alliance Networks for Innovation? Empirical Evidence

This study examines the impact of different degrees of organizational coupling among the members of innovation alliance project networks on the commercial performance of collaborative innovations. Specifically, we study how type of innovation (modular vs. architectural innovation) moderates this relationship. Using data from 664 product innovation networks from five different industries in the United States, we find that the degree of organizational coupling among innovation network members significantly affects the commercial performance of collaborative innovations and that the type of innovation has a significant moderating effect. More specifically, the impact on commercial innovation performance of organizational coupling is positive for modular innovations and negative for architectural innovations.     

Using Product Bundling to Facilitate the Adoption Process of Radical Innovations*

Generally, radical innovations are not easily adopted in the market. Potential adopters experience difficulties to comprehend and evaluate radical innovations due to their newness in terms of technology and benefits offered. Consequently, adoption intentions may remain low. This paper proposes bundling as an instrument to address these problems. More specifically, this paper examines how consumer comprehension, evaluation, and adoption intention of radical innovations may be enhanced by bundling such products with existing products. In addition, it is argued that the proposed effects are contingent upon the level of fit perceived to exist between the radical innovation and the product that accompanies it in the bundle. Furthermore, consumers' prior knowledge may affect the influence of bundling on the innovation adoption process as the interpretation of the meaning of new products may be strongly related to prior knowledge. This study therefore investigates whether consumer prior knowledge has such a moderating effect. Hypotheses are tested by means of an experimental study with three different radical innovations and distinguishing among offering the radical innovation separately, offering the radical innovation in a bundle with moderate perceived fit between the products, and offering the radical innovation in a bundle with high perceived fit between the products. Results show that product bundling enhances the new product's evaluation and adoption intention, although it does not increase comprehension of the radical innovation. Moreover, the results show that comprehension, evaluation and adoption intention of the innovation significantly decrease when consumers perceive a moderate fit between the products in a bundle. Taken together, these findings contribute to the bundling literature by showing not only that product bundling may indeed be an effective instrument to introduce a radical innovation but also that product bundling may be counterproductive when ignoring the critical role of perceived product fit as core characteristic of a product bundle. In addition, the notion that product bundling helps to enhance the evaluation and purchase intention of new and relatively complex products suggests a suitable strategy for new product managers to enhance benefits and reduce learning costs for radical innovations. Moreover, the effects of bundling on consumer appraisals of radical innovations are also shown to depend on the level of knowledge respondents possess regarding the product category of the radical innovation. More specifically, if bundled with a familiar product, novices tend to evaluate the innovative product more positively, but for experts no such effect can be detected. As such, these results provide additional specific implications for managers when introducing radical innovations in the market. Offering a radical innovation in a product bundle could be a fruitful strategy for companies that target customers with little or no prior knowledge in the product domain.     

The Role of Future‐Market Focus in the Early Stages of NPD across Varying Levels of Innovativeness

The concept of future‐market focus (FMF) arose out of the debate about firm size and incumbency in the face of radical or disruptive innovations, and has been demonstrated to have a positive correlation with radical innovation (RI) success. This study examines the relationship between FMF and the processes used in the early stages of NPD for four types of innovation projects: incremental innovations, technological breakthroughs, market breakthroughs, and radical innovations. We found that the future‐market focus of a project team can influence the early stage processes used in a new product innovation project, and does so differentially across levels of innovativeness. In particular, the concept generation process, understanding of market needs, and screening decision criteria are different for low‐ versus high‐FMF projects and there are differences based on the level of innovation. In addition, we found that radical innovation projects rated low in FMF are markedly different than the radical innovation projects described in prior studies.     

More Innovation with Less? A Strategic Contingency View of Slack Resources,Information Search,and Radical Innovation

This study investigates the nonobvious interrelationship between slack resources and radical innovation. While organizational slack and innovation literature has implicitly recognized a link between these constructs, at least two important aspects of their relationship have been overlooked. First, little attention has been paid to the mechanisms by which slack resources become beneficial for radical innovation. Drawing on information search and organizational learning theories, we propose distal search activity—searching for information outside the current knowledge domain of the firm—as a mediating variable between slack resources and radical innovation. Second, little consideration has been given to the strategic orientation of the firm as the context in which slack resources are deployed to enhance radical innovation. Adopting Miles and Snow's typology of strategic archetypes, we propose a moderating role of strategy in the slack resources–distal search–radical innovation chain of relations. We tested our hypotheses on a sample of Chinese high‐technology firms, using multiple informant survey data and regression analysis. Our results indicate that slack resources are positively related to radical innovation, and that this relationship is partially mediated by distal search. Thus, there appear to be two routes (one direct, one indirect) to transform slack resources into radical innovation. Further, moderation analysis shows that the effect of slack resources on distal search is strongest among analyzers, while the effect of distal search on radical innovation is strongest among defenders. In sum, our results suggest that analyzers are relatively more dependent on the amount of slack resources compared to other strategy types, that is, resource constraints would have a more negative effect on analyzers. We discuss theoretical and managerial implications of our study and conclude by suggesting future research opportunities.