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The purpose of this paper is to explore and highlight the particular innovation characteristics and modes of the Chinese online game industry from a networking perspective.

This research is qualitative. Both primary and secondary data are used, which is collected through desk research on related documents and long‐term participative observation and personal experiences. This paper begins with an overview of the online game industry's innovation process and types; then constructs a framework that contains four innovation modes with different networks to guide the analysis and organization on the empirical findings; finally, the paper proposes some implications for companies and government.

This paper is an attempt to open the black box of the innovation of the Chinese online game industry. Born as an incomplete and virtual product, the innovation modes evolve from closed to a combination of open and networking ones. Producer‐driven Innovation Network Mode shows that game companies can get innovation resources through its focal network. Producer‐user Interaction Mode shows that players' have tremendous innovation potential. Open Collaborative Network Mode shows that power is distributed and the roles of actors are blurred.

This paper offers an analysis of the Chinese online game industry from the innovation side and partly fills the research gap. Also, this paper emphasized the users' innovation ability and a hybrid of different innovation modes, which can be seen as a successful theory test of user innovation, innovation networks, and open innovation theories in the Chinese context.

Purpose – After tracing the development of the global value chains (GVC) approach, the chapter argues that by refocusing on the international strategies of lead firms it is possible to bring location specificity issues into play and contribute to retrieve a distinctive international content to the GVC governance theory.

Design/methodology/approach – The chapter discusses the GVC governance theory, drawing from recent contributions in the field of international business (IB).

Findings – Although designed to account for the rise of new inter-firm networks controlled by international lead firms, the new GVC theory of governance somehow lacks a distinct international content and, privileging transactional constraints, falls short of explicitly considering variations in lead firm structural characteristics and strategies. An alternative governance schema is then proposed, taking explicitly into account the strategic evaluations that lead firms carry out with regard to their internal resources compared to suppliers’.

Research limitations/implications (if applicable) – The chapter provides the outlines of a new promising international research agenda for GVC researchers. Additional research is needed to further investigate the relation between location specificity, the strategic motives to go global and the international organisation of the value chain.

Practical implications (if applicable) – The alternative governance schema proposed in the chapter aspires to represent a simple tool aimed at supporting managers in the establishment of the appropriate boundaries of the firm.

Originality/value – The chapter shows that both IB research and GVC analysis could greatly benefit from reasoned cross-fertilisation.

New product design is an established field in the literature. It is either analysed inside the firm; or when using a value chain perspective it is limited to the interactions between manufacturers and suppliers (in producer‐driven commodity chains). The current research adopts a downstream perspective, analysing the relationships between manufacturers and retailers in relation to the new product design process. Seeks to conduct research in the clothing industry; that has the specificity of being a buyer‐driven commodity chain where fashion makes design a key dimension for the success of a product.

The research was empirical in nature, involving 50 semi‐structured face‐to‐face interviews in France, the USA and the UK at all points along the clothing value chain.

In the clothing industry, the strategy of integrating design and retail has resulted in a more flexible design process and therefore, in an increased product performance. This strategy has been developed by both retailers and designers. The strategy of integrating design and retail has resulted in a change of boundaries in the clothing value chain.

Results are currently limited to the clothing sectors, and they are yet to be generalised to other buyer‐driven commodity chains.

Managers in clothing retail firms or in clothing design firms, wanting to increase product performance, should implement the strategy of integrating design and retail.

The paper opens a new field of research, namely: the focus on new product design with a value chain perspective that concentrates on downstream in the chain.

The purpose of this paper is to synthesize lessons from the agricultural value chain models and their associated financing mechanisms in China and India as to provide policy recommendations on how best to facilitate development of efficient and inclusive value chains.

The paper builds on a review of the existing literature on agricultural value chains and their financing mechanisms, and draws lessons from it for strengthening interface between product and financial markets in order to enable smallholders capture benefits of the value addition.

From the comparative review of value chain financing mechanisms and current policy contexts the authors find dominance of internal financing of value chains (in terms of provision of inputs, technology and services) in both the countries. Value chain finance from commercial banks and other financial institutions is limited and mainly through tripartite agreements among the financing institutions, lead firms and farmers.

The lessons drawn from various value chain models and their financing mechanisms provide feedback to financial institutions and policymakers to take measures to strengthen value chain finance in smallholder agriculture.

The paper undertakes a rigorous review of the existing value chain models and their financing mechanisms in light of the most recent research on emerging innovations and development strategies, in order to glean key lessons for policy recommendations on strengthening linkages between financial and product markets.

The purpose of this paper is to understand how the cross-cultural collaboration between developed market and emerging economies promotes an inclusive global value chain (GVC) through innovation and technology transfer. Drawing on global rattan industry, this paper identifies the three typologies and social mechanism of cross-cultural collaboration in GVC.

This study uses a qualitative method with a case study of rattan industry. The case study analysis covers the linkages between upstream industries in emerging economies and downstream industries in developed countries.

The result shows that innovation and technology transfer play an essential role in the cross-cultural collaboration through presenting the creative value-adding process beyond the simple trade of rattan. This study identifies the social mechanism of cross-cultural collaboration in three GVC typologies of rattan industry.

The study was undertaken between 2015 and 2017. The observed value chain in rattan industry context demonstrates the selected business network from Indonesia to the European countries.

There were some activities that worked well for decades, such as creative innovation and technology transfer from multinational corporations to small businesses. The initiative to promote brand seemed to work less well for the local designers in developing countries from being part of the GVC. The creative innovation and technology transfer from multinational corporations to rattan farmers continued to struggle.

This study draws a distinction between the typologies of GVC, where cross-cultural collaboration has developed slowly and those where it comes about quickly. This extends the discussion about creative value between players in developed and developing countries, including the social mechanism of cross-cultural collaboration in GVC.

This paper aims at enriching the literature on international business (IB) studies to include insights from Global Value Chain (GVC) analysis to better explain how MNCs can orchestrate a global network organization. A first important contribution of the GVC literature is that it shifts the focus from single firms to their value chains, providing instruments to study how activities are split and organized among different firms at the industry level, and how MNCs can implement different governing mechanisms within a network-based setting. The GVC literature also highlights that retailers (as global buyers) often act as ‘lead firms’ in shaping the trajectories of global industries, while IB studies have so far focused predominantly on manufacturing firms. A fine-grained analysis of alternative forms of governance characterizing value chains can offer additional elements in explaining how MNCs can manage their network relationships in a global scenario. Finally, through their focus on upgrading, GVC studies suggest that knowledge flows and innovation dynamics taking place within value chains are as important as those taking place within the MNC’s organizational border. We conclude by arguing that these insights can help the IB literature to examine the challenges and opportunities MNCs face in engaging with suppliers and to explain the dynamic evolution of orchestrating global activities at the global level.

Despite geographical proximity, major economic differences exist between Western European countries and the formerly socialist Eastern European countries. The main objective of this study is to develop a better understanding of internationalization decision processes in this specific context.

By means of multiple case study research, six Austrian and five Hungarian companies in order to extend and refine existing theory on internationalization decisions given the current situation in Central Europe are analyzed. In particular, the paper uses extant literature to build a conceptual framework from which we derive propositions as a basis and a guide for data collection and analysis.

In addition to cost considerations, process and product innovations are becoming increasingly important dimensions in explaining the reasons for internationalization projects. The reasons for internalization and solutions (relocated products and processes, entry mode and location) are closely interrelated.

Although this framework for the internationalization decision process is applied in a very specific context, the authors believe that the framework can also be very helpful in understanding these decision processes in a more general setting. In particular, companies in other regions where developed and emerging countries are relatively close to one another might be able to utilize our framework and results (in Asia or America).

The fragmentation of the production process is a major theme of research in international business. Trade benefits arise from the “slicing up” of the aggregate value chain, as well as the entry of new countries bearing low labor costs. If, initially, multinational corporations (MNCs) relocated only standardized, low-value manufacturing activities in new emerging economies (exploitative offshoring), now they are also offshoring their knowledge-intensive activities (explorative offshoring). In the past, the literature on internationalization was mainly focused on the characterization of the MNC as a specific monolithic organization active in the international production. In the present, numerous analyses have discussed the international location of R&D activities, mainly in advanced countries. The foreign R&D subsidiaries are still tightly linked to the headquarters, maintaining a controlled position. Future research must address two orders of issues. The first is the progressive autonomy of the foreign subsidiaries, which are more and more developing new and independent lines of research. This process leads MNCs to mobilize and leverage untapped pools of knowledge scattered around the world. The second is the R&D offshoring toward emerging economies. This complex process can be characterized as a move from the smile model discussed extensively by Ram Mudambi (where emerging economies were considered as pools of low-cost labor tout court) to a new model, called here the λ (lambda) model (where emerging economies are also pools of skilled labor). This paper will explore these new trends using some illustrative cases: L'Oréal (FR), Pfizer (US), ST Microelectronics (CH), and Geox (I). The cases reveal the double orientation of MNCs toward emerging economies, where both explorative and exploitative offshoring takes place.

The discourse on global value chains (GVC) is undergoing a transformation in terms of its conceptualisation, theorisation and pragmatic applications. Today, the production systems have become more complex as global economic order continues to witness marked geo-economic manoeuvring. Thus, the direction of discourse on GVC ought to move from mere theoretical propositions toward becoming more evidence based. There have been recent studies that have used the governance and upgrading propositions by Gary Gereffi and others to seek quantitative evidence. This study aims to decipher the quantitative discourse on GVC and to set the emerging and future research agenda.

Through a systematic literature review, the authors first analyse the quantitative studies on GVC carried out during the last two decades. The authors then outline a future research agenda and examine a few relevant modelling techniques that could potentially be used to solicit newer evidence in GVC research.

The authors categorise the quantitative discourse on GVC into three crucial themes, namely, GVC framework, GVC participation and position, environmental aspects and regionalisation in GVC. The most commonly used quantitative techniques are gravity model, panel data estimation, structural decomposition analysis and computable general equilibrium modelling.

This paper contributes to the GVC discourse in two ways. Firstly, the authors argue that the theoretical frameworks within the GVC discourse should be complemented by evidence-based quantitative studies. Secondly, the authors suggest potential modelling techniques that can be used on the emerging and future research agenda.