Marta Najda-Janoszka

Innovative Activity of Small Tourist Enterprises – Cooperation with Local Institutional Partners

According to the open innovation model an effective strategy for increasing innovation and competitiveness of the region should be based on active and multilevel cooperation among operators of the local tourism business environment. It is commonly assumed that an exceptionally important role in creating a favorable environment for the cooperative practices in the region is performed by local authorities. Yet, a modest number of research findings presented in the literature indicate a rather high level of inertia of local authorities in creating appropriate conditions for tourism business development, thus putting in question the effectiveness of performed intermediary function in the process of knowledge transfer among tourist enterprises. Given the paucity of empirical evidence on effectiveness of innovation policy interventions at the regional level, this article presents the empirical findings regarding cooperation in innovation between tourist enterprises and local institutional agents.

Matching Imitative Activity of High-Tech Firms with Entrepreneurial Orientation

As pointed by numerous scholars high technology sectors are very apt for studying entrepreneurial activities due to their high levels of innovativeness. However, taking into account the highly dynamic and substantially hostile environment in those sectors innovation may often not be the best strategic choice for market entry. In high-tech industries the boundaries between the innovation and imitation are often blurred. Hence, following the pioneer does not eliminate risk of market entry and is not necessarily equal to lack of capabilities, weak market position or inability to recognize market opportunities. In fact the business practice confirms the extensive utilization of imitation strategy by technology entrepreneurs. Meanwhile, the literature on entrepreneurship focuses almost exclusively on original innovators underestimating the importance of imitation in the growth process and indicating shortage of research on imitative activities of entrepreneurs. Therefore this article presents discussion on the applicability of entrepreneurial orientation to imitators from the high-tech industries.