Sources of information as determinants of novelty of innovation in manufacturing firms: evidence from the 1999 Statistics Canada Innovation Survey

This paper uses the data of the 1999 Statistics Canada Innovation Survey to address a crucial question for the understanding of novelly of innovation in the manufacturing sector: what are the effects of sources of information on novelty of innovation in manufacturing firms? The study considers the impact of four categories of sources of information that firms use to develop or improve their products or manufacturing processes: internal sources, market Sources, research sources, and generally available sources of information. The two most important results of this study are that. compared to firms that have introduced innovations that were premieres for them. firms that have developed innovations considered as world premieres or national premieres are more likely to: (1) use a lamer variety of sources of information, and (2) more especially, to use a much larger variety of research sources to develop or improve, their products or processes. The policy implications deriving from these results are very important: novelty of innovation could be increased in developing policies promoting stronger linkages between firms and government laboratories and universities. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.