Buyer Market Power and Innovative Activities

This empirical paper deals with the effects of supplier and buyer market concentration on the innovative behavior of suppliers within the German automobile industry. The data set contains firms from all size classes and covers measures of innovation input as well as innovation output. It can be shown that (a) firms' innovation and R & D-employment intensity will decline (increase) in buyer concentrations if supplier markets are low (high) concentrated; (b) buyers' pressure on input prices reduces suppliers' innovation expenditures and their incentive to develop new products; (c) a small number of competitors in suppliers markets and a large stock of customers stimulates innovative behavior; (d) small and medium sized suppliers invest more in their innovative activities but have less probability of realizing innovations than larger firms; and (e) higher technological capabilities lead to higher innovation input and output.