Knowledge acquisition in innovation networks : venture capital vs. R&D cooperation
Résumé
This paper examines the contribution of different partners in innovation networks. We focus our research on two forms of partnership, partnerships with venture capitalists(VCs) and research and development (R&D) cooperation, whose main objectives are to overcome financial constraints and to obtain external knowledge. We distinguish between two types of knowledge: technological and market knowledge. We use a dataset of 140 French firms to examine the contribution of VCs and R&D cooperation in the acquisition of these two types of knowledge. Our main findings suggest that R&D cooperation brings technological knowledge, whereas the presence of a VC in the firm provides knowledge about the market.