Innovation complementarity, cooperation partners, and new product export: Evidence from Poland

The network approach to innovation and internationalization has been developing since the early 1990s (Johanson & Mattsson, 1988; Rothwell, 1992) and dominates the recent models of innovation and internationalization of firms. Nevertheless, the extensive literature referring to these models has not yet inspired comprehensive studies combining these two research streams. This paper addresses the gap by linking innovation, innovation cooperation, and export in one study. The findings are based on firm-level empirical data collected by the Community Innovation Survey for Poland in 2011, embracing the sample of 6855 medium and large industrial firms. The quantitative analysis is conducted with the use of the classification tree AID algorithm. The examination of complementarities between various types of innovation—product, process, and marketing innovations—shows that combining product and process innovation increases new product export intensity. The analysis of the relationship between various types of innovation cooperation partners and new product export identifies foreign partners as conducive to increased export intensity. The findings may be specific to firms from transition and emerging economies indicating their path to international competitiveness in more mature markets. However, the study also offers a more universal contribution both to innovation and internationalization theory. It affirms the need for a more holistic view of innovation and confirms the necessity to apply the network approach to research on interrelationships between innovation and internationalization of firms.