Yuan-Chieh Chang

Social Capital and Creativity in R&D Project Teams

The existing research contributes to our understanding about the value of social capital in a wide range of social science disciplines however, it does not well address the role of social capital in creativity for research and development (R&D) project teams in a given context. Using a sample of 54 R&D project teams in high-technology firms of Taiwan, we examined the impacts of social capital on creativity of R&D project teams from an intra-team perspective. Results of factor analysis revealed four factors extracted from the concept of social capital, namely social interaction, network ties, mutual trust, and shared goals. Findings suggested that social interaction and network ties had significant and positive impacts on creativity of R&D project teams, but mutual trust and shared goals did not. Managerial implications for managing social capital in R&D project teams are discussed.

Benefits of co‐operation on innovative performance: evidence from integrated circuits and biotechnology firms in the UK and Taiwan

The increase of strategic alliance and national or pan-national government collaborative programmes has highlighted the shifting management and policy focus from inducing in-house R&D to promoting a joint partnership between firms and knowledge-generating organisations in the increasingly complex and costly innovation process. Both the ‘dynamic capability’ school and the ‘innovation network’ theorists demonstrate that inter-organisational co-operation has become a crucial mechanism for ‘collective innovation’. However, little attempt has been undertaken to examine the relationship between inter-organisational co-operation and innovative performance at the firm level. The innovative activities and inter-organisational co-operation of integrated circuits and biotechnology sectors across Taiwan and the UK are investigated via a postal questionnaire survey. Multiple logistic regression models are deployed. The result reveals that the types of inter-organisational co-operation enhancing a firms innovative performance vary across sectors and countries. Despite the variation, this paper argues that a firms networking ability to co-operate with buyer firms, supplier firms and external organisations is becoming imperative for enhancing innovation in the increasingly distributed innovation process.

The Impacts of Academic Patenting and Licensing on Knowledge Production and Diffusion: A Test of the Anti-Commons Effect in Taiwan

This paper empirically examines the emerging anti-commons effect of academic patenting and licensing on knowledge production and diffusion in Taiwan. Through a dataset of 229 Taiwanese academic patent inventors, the results reveal that the anti-commons effect is not significant as expected. However, this effect has becomes more vivid in application-oriented research and disclosure delay while academic patent inventors have involved more in licensing activities. Programs to encourage academic licensing should be aware of the side effects on academic knowledge production and diffusion.

Academic research commercialization and knowledge production and diffusion: the moderating effects of entrepreneurial commitment

This paper empirically examines the relationship between research commercialization, entrepreneurial commitment, and knowledge production and diffusion in academia. Through a dataset of 229 academic patent inventors, this paper reveals that the effects of research commercialization on publication quantity, application-oriented research, and disclosure delay are moderated by the entrepreneurial commitment of faculty members. This paper concludes that encouraging entrepreneurial commitment of faculty members may possibly drive academics away from their traditional approaches in producing and diffusing knowledge.

Industrializing Academic Knowledge in Taiwan

OVERVIEW: How to effectively utilize and leverage academic knowledge has become a concern for university leaders and faculty, firms and policymakers alike. A questionnaire survey of 122 Taiwanese universities confirms that the “cognitive-governance” orientation of universities has gradually shifted from the “scientific-government” to a more “scientific-economic” one since the Science and Technology Basic Law was enacted in 1999. For Taiwanese universities, intellectual property infrastructure build-up, patenting and licensing activities have been steadily enhanced. The survey also reveals that the transfer of knowledge from universities to industry is largely dependent on short-term, personal and contract-based mechanisms, rather than on longterm, formal organizational, and joint capability development mechanisms. These conclusions have managerial and policy implications for capitalizing academic knowledge, not only in Taiwan but in other economies as well.

FACTORS NURTURING ACADEMIC ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN TAIWAN

Although academic research institutions have become a major player in protecting, transferring, and commercializing their knowledge base, little research has examined in enterprising research results from the angle of academic entrepreneurs. This paper examined the factors fostering academic entrepreneurship from institutional, organizational, and individual aspects, especially in Taiwan. Based on the Patent Database of the National Science Council, Taiwan, 474 academic entrepreneurs who owned patents were identified. Via a postal survey, 229 questionnaires were collected with an overall. response rate of 48%. Through factor analysis, five key success factors fostering academic entrepreneurship were identified. The key success factors to foster academic entrepreneurship in Taiwan include entrepreneurial network, organizational infrastructures, entrepreneurial legitimacy, entrepreneurial pro-activeness, and entrepreneurial rewards. Thus, the paper concluded that nurturing academic entrepreneurship in Taiwan is evidently shaped by not only micro factors such as entrepreneurial networks and characteristics but also macro factors such as entrepreneurial infrastructures and rewards from universities and increasing legitimacy of academic entrepreneurship.

Strategic technology sourcing in corporate ventures

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the strategic technology outsourcing of corporate ventures from an integrated perspective.Design/methodology/approach – The proposed model argues that technology sourcing modes are jointly determined by the technological regime, industry‐specific factors and resource‐based view (RBV), as well as firm‐specific factors. Four Taiwanese top publicly traded pharmaceutical companies dedicated to biotechnology are studied.Findings – This paper demonstrates that firms most likely to outsource technology are characterized by the following technological regime factors: reliant on external sources of innovation, tight IPR protection, path independent from the existing technology trajectory, less complexity, easy to codify and having resource‐based (RB) factors: irrelevant to the core competence, weak complementary assets, and autonomous innovation.Practical implications – Current approaches generally focus on technology sourcing with a single strategic theory. New ve...

Universities as patent- and licensing income-generating institutions: a survey in Taiwan

This study examines the preliminary results of patenting and licensing activities in Taiwanese Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) from 1997 to 2001. We propose a framework to analyse the influence of a universitys internal Intellectual Property Right (IPR) management and external research partnerships on creating income through patenting and licensing. Through a postal questionnaire survey, all 122 HEIs in Taiwan were surveyed. The empirical results demonstrate that internalised IPR management capability and external research partnerships have substantially increased the amount of academic patents and licensing income. The paper reveals that the relation between external research partnership and patterns of academic licensing is moderated by industry research funding, towards more domestic and partner-oriented licensing. This has crucial policy implications for enhancing effective national triple-helix interactions.

The influence of geographical knowledge networks on innovative performance: evidences from the Hsinchu Science-based Industrial Park, Taiwan

This paper examines how geographically inter-organisational networks affect innovative performance of firms located in industrial clusters, especially the Hsinchu Science-based Industrial Park (HSIP) in Taiwan. Based on an exhaustive manual search of the United Daily News Group database, 1445 inter-organisational alliances were identified in the period from 1991 to 2002. This research revealed that the innovation performances of firms in industrial clusters may benefit not only from networking in industrial clusters but also from national and international networking. Policies should encourage industrial clusters to establish symbiotic innovation networks between local, national and global partners.

The trinity of entrepreneurial team dynamics: cognition, conflicts and cohesion

Purpose Cognition, conflict and cohesion constitute an inseparable body of group dynamics in entrepreneurial teams. There have been few studies of how entrepreneurial team members interact with each other to enhance venture performance. The purpose of this paper is to develop and test a model that explains the trinity of cognition, conflict and cohesion in terms of social interaction between entrepreneurial team members. Design/methodology/approach Drawing upon the existing literature concerning entrepreneurial teams, the hypothesized model posits that shared cognition influences team cohesion through the mediating effects of intra-team conflicts. The model also postulates that team cohesion is positively associated with new venture performance and entrepreneurial satisfaction. Structural equation modeling is used to test the hypothesized model, using data that were collected from 203 entrepreneurial teams from technology-based companies in Taiwan. Findings The results show that shared cognition in entrepreneurial team members maintains team cohesion by restraining conflict and that team cohesion has a positive influence on entrepreneurial members’ satisfaction and new venture profitability. Practical implications The leader of a new venture team must endeavor to improve shared cognition between entrepreneurial members. To strengthen shared cognition, the leader can hold formal workshops to build consensus, informal meetings to share views, or use social media to enhance common understanding. Originality/value This paper verifies the connections between shared cognition, conflicts and cohesion in entrepreneurial teams in predicting new venture success and highlights the importance of cultivating a shared cognition in an entrepreneurial team to manage conflicts.