Ednilson Bernardes

Overcoming barriers to adoption of environmentally-friendly innovations through design and strategy

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore how a company which developed an environmentally friendly innovation attempted to address diffusion issues. Specifically, the purpose is to describe the ways in which an electric vehicle (EV) infrastructure company, in partnership with a major car manufacturer, tried to address barriers to diffusion of an environmentally friendly innovation during the development stage to improve the likelihood of success and lessons learned from its failure. Design/methodology/approach – The authors explore a single instrumental case of an Israeli company that developed infrastructure for EVs in partnership with a major automaker. The authors collected data using a series of semi-structured interviews at the companies’ headquarters, through direct observation in the company, and through the examination of archival and secondary data sources. Findings – The authors find that the company tried to incorporate design features in both the product and organization to address ke...

Examining supply market scanning and internal communication climate as facilitators of supply chain integration

Purpose – This paper aims to examine if supply market scanning and an organization’s internal communication climate are related to greater internal integration of supply management within the organization, and its subsequent effects on supplier integration and supplier performance. Design/methodology/approach – A conceptual model, using information processing theory as a theoretical lens, is proposed and tested utilizing survey data gathered from supply management professionals from five European countries. Findings – Supply market scanning and the organization’s internal communication climate are positively related to internal integration of supply management. Internal integration subsequently is positively related to supplier integration, which partially mediates the relationship with supplier performance. Internal integration is also positively and directly related to supplier performance. Research limitations/implications – Supply management fulfills a key role by being a conduit of information from t...

Supplier Innovation Strategy and Performance: A Matter of Supply Chain Market Positioning

Extant research consistently illustrates the positive benefits customers get from having more innovative suppliers. However, do suppliers benefit financially from positioning themselves as leading innovators? Utilizing a secondary dataset of 1039 supplier to customer base observations, and grounding our study in the structure-conduct-performance framework, we examine the extent to which suppliers are able to benefit from pursuing a more leading or lagging innovation strategy within their industry. While in general we find that suppliers employing a leading innovator strategy have higher levels of financial performance, such an effect is not universal. Rather, the ability of the supplying firm to leverage their innovation strategy into increased performance is highly contingent upon not only the innovation levels of their own industry, but also the innovation levels of the industries which they supply. Our results, therefore, suggest that it would be advantageous for suppliers to take a supply chain perspective and strategically incorporate the innovation characteristics of their customers when determining whether to pursue a leading or lagging innovation strategy.