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The present paper seeks to provide a new insight into intellectual capital classification by theoretically and empirically differentiating relations‐based knowledge into social capital and relational capital. Additionally, taking into account the key role played by radical innovation to compete in the context defined by the “knowledge‐based economy”, the aim is to empirically investigate the possible effect of both relations‐based intellectual capital components on the development of this kind of innovation by firms.

Data were obtained from a questionnaire responded to by 251 Spanish high and medium‐high tech firms. Based on their answers, exploratory factor analysis and regression analysis are carried out.

As theoretically proposed, relations‐based intellectual capital can be separated into social and relational capital, with social capital as the main component. Both elements have a significantly positive influence on radical innovation developed by firms in the sample, although those relationships maintained with external agents seem to have a higher impact.

The research contributes to the intellectual capital field by integrating the arguments provided by social capital literature and empirically separating relations‐based knowledge into two differentiated components. The paper also contributes to the knowledge management field by highlighting the important role played by knowledge emerging from relationships around the firm (both internal and external) in the development of radical innovation, whose antecedents have received little attention in the literature.

The purpose of this paper is to advance new insights into how internal and external social capital (SC) facets influence exploratory and exploitative innovation directly, and indirectly through absorptive capability (AC), by drawing on the relational and knowledge-based views.

The paper empirically tests the developed model using 135 survey responses from managers in construction contractor firms. Data were factor analysed, and path estimates determined using partial least squares structural equation modelling to test the hypotheses.

The results reveal that each social capital (SC) facet has direct benefits for both exploratory and exploitative innovation. The findings also show a mix of full and partial mediation paths between the facets of SC and innovation types through AC.

Extant research linking SC facets with innovation categories is fragmented. Added to this fragmentation is the dearth of studies linking both intra-firm and inter-firm SC with exploratory and exploitative innovation in firms. This paper makes a novel contribution by testing a model of the direct and indirect links (through AC) between internal and external SC and both exploratory and exploitative innovation in the context of construction contractor firms. The findings show how both facets of SC are necessary for exploratory and exploitative innovation. It reveals the types of relationships and capabilities necessary for specific innovation objectives.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the area of knowledge integration between relations based upon the assumption that if you do not integrate knowledge between the different relations, the possibility of maintaining, improving or adjusting your product portfolio through your offshore working relationships will either disappear or be severely reduced.

The experienced journey of four small‐ and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) within the textile and wood industries are presented regarding how they change their direction and organisational routines due to challenges concerning knowledge integration within their respective supply relations.

Different approaches are shown of how to combine different knowledge dimensions within the supply chain and how the demands towards relations management capabilities are affected by the challenges of mainly knowledge transfer and translation created by the strategic offshore sourcing decisions.

As the conclusions are based upon a limited number of cases studied within a limited time frame, further investigations to confirm the findings, especially with case companies that integrate more complex knowledge types, would be interesting.

The paper proposes that when making strategic offshore sourcing decisions, companies should consider more classic variables like cost, quality and flexibility in much more detail and the different knowledge dimensions (knowledge characteristics, learning capability, knowledge flow, cultural characteristics and stickiness) identified in the paper and thereby the longer‐term demands regarding knowledge integration in offshore supply relations.

The paper identifies different approaches of how to combine different knowledge dimensions within the supply chain and how relations management capabilities are affected by the knowledge integration challenges of mainly knowledge transfer and translation created by the strategic offshore sourcing decisions in SMEs in the manufacturing industry.

The purpose of this paper is to answer the question of how continuity and change coexist in the work of institutional actors who can combine maintenance, disruption and/or creation. Past studies mention this coexistence without an explanation.

The paper develops a perspective through literature review.

Institutional actors are both socialized into the norm-oriented space of continuity and maintenance through their reciprocal relations and associated social knowledge and roles and disciplined into the goal-oriented space of change and disruption/creation through their power relations and associated expert discourse and subject positions. Their institutional existence indicates a particular combination of reciprocity and power and thus their work includes changing degrees of maintenance, disruption and creation, depending on the nature of this combination.

The paper points out research directions on the relational conditions of the actors, which facilitate or constrain their work toward institutional continuity or change.

Organizations whose concern is to continue the existing practices in a stable environment should emphasize reciprocal relations whereas organizations whose concern is to change those practices for more effectiveness in a dynamic environment should emphasize power relations. Also, too much emphasis on either relations leads to inflexibility or instability.

The paper provides an explanation on the sources of coexistence of continuity and change in institutional work. It also contributes to the discussions on contingency of institutions, resistance productive of institutional change, reflexivity of institutional actors and intersubjective construction of institutional work.

Modelling complex knowledge resources can be problematical as there is currently no formalism that can represent the nature of the data‐seeking process at a conceptual level. The purpose of this paper is to develop a knowledge representation formalism, the functional entity relationship diagram (FERD), which comprises a set of extensions to the industry standard entity relationship diagram established by Chen.

The research uses a design science approach to extend the existing ER formalism using the question‐answering (QA) paradigm. It is an extension of standard data modelling theory and is consistent with category theory.

The authors defined the functional entity, an encapsulated data resource that acts as a QA system and enumerated a typology of nine functional entities generated from two established principles to produce a modelling framework that can depict all existentially quantifiable relations, and demonstrated a satisficing extension to that framework (non‐Aristotelian functional entities) for those situations that do not permit such relations. Further, the authors discussed the system of knowledge mixins for qualifying the relations, and presented an adjunct to the framework, cartographic functional entities, to permit formally verifiable documentation.

Future research will address the pragmatic/sociological dimensions of FERD modelling, and test its utility in field case studies.

The FERD conceptualisation incorporates traditional IS modelling as one aspect of a richer modelling system, and thereby includes all of traditional IS repositories as first class, unmediated sources of knowledge. The establishment of standard types of functional entities can provide a framework for the methodical conversion of the declarative design level to the imperative implementation level. It thus has significant practical implications for the management and use of knowledge in organisations.

The research is original and provides a valuable contribution to conceptual modelling and representation of complex knowledge systems.

This research draws upon the resource-based view and the dynamic capabilities view’s premise that a firm’s resources and capabilities determine competitive advantage. Specifically, the purpose of this paper is to develop and test a model entailing simultaneously the impact of intangible resources; and dynamic capabilities and entrepreneurial orientation on export performance.

Therefore, the authors developed a study based on a survey of 265 Portuguese exporting companies. Data were submitted to a multivariate statistical analysis and a linear regression model was applied in order to predict the influence of the intangible resources on export performance. The structural equations model was used for this purpose.

The results show that export performance is directly impacted by dynamic capabilities and entrepreneurial orientation. However, intangible resources do not have a significant direct impact on entrepreneurial orientation; they do have an indirect effect through the mediation of dynamic capabilities. These findings highlight the catalyst role of dynamic capabilities and entrepreneurial orientation, leveraging the role of intangible resources as antecedents of export performance. These findings are valuable inputs for exporting managers and public entities.

While previous authors have attempted to analyse certain aspects of this process (linkage between intangible resources and export performance), this research developed a framework that combines these ones with entrepreneurial orientation and dynamic capabilities.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the individual and joint effects of the two design dimensions, form design and functional design, and moderating role of product innovativeness and technological sophistication in consumer’s evaluation of new products. Employing theoretical underpinnings from categorization theory, this paper investigates two major research questions. First, what type of form is more advantageous for a radically new product or an incrementally new product? Second, is there an individual difference in consumer evaluations to innovative products with various form designs?

One pre-test and three between-subject experiments were performed. In Experiments 1 and 2, a two-way between-group ANOVA analysis was performed to examine the effect of form and the degree of technological innovation on attitude toward the product using different product categories (car and camera). In Experiment 3, a three-way between-group ANOVA analysis was performed to explore the impact of form, the degree of technological innovation and consumer technological sophistication on attitude toward the product.

The results from the three experiments conducted demonstrate that, first, whereas the form design for incremental innovations must be closer to the incumbent products for favorable evaluations, less typical form is evaluated as good as a more typical form for radical innovations. Second, form design of an innovative product matters more to the technologically more sophisticated consumers (experts).

This paper extends the previous design literature and fills the gap of under-researched area by demonstrating that individual difference, technological sophistication, moderates the design effect on consumer evaluation of innovation; providing boundary condition of when the atypical form is not penalized in spite of consumer’s perceived learning cost; examining how the form and function interplay in “high-status product”; and demonstrating how to strengthen the reliability and validity by replicating the study. Managerially, this paper demonstrates that innovating firms can influence the perceived value of new products using form and functionality, and marketing managers who launch really new products have strategic freedom of choosing own product design.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how consumers’ willingness to buy is influenced by two essential design elements: form and functional design. Form design refers to appearance and can be categorized as typical or non-typical. Function design relates to product features and can be the basis of whether a new product is perceived as a radically new product (RNP) vs an incrementally new product (INP). An interaction between form (typical vs non-typical) and function (RNP vs INP) was hypothesized and examined based on consumers’ knowledge of a product category and level of technological innovativeness.

Two between subject experiments were conducted in which two factors were manipulated (2×2 ANOVA): the degree of technological innovation (RNP vs INP) and form (more typical vs less typical).

Findings reveal that form design has a minimal impact on consumers’ evaluations of INPs, but less typical form design is preferred over typical form design for RNPs. Moreover, form design matters more to consumers who are technologically more innovative (vs less innovative) and more knowledgeable (vs less knowledgeable).

The managerial implications are multiple. Depending on the degree of the technological innovation, new design form can be strategically aligned to the function of a new product to increase perceived value – an effect observed among South Korean consumers that we anticipate will extend upon other cultures high in uncertainty avoidance.

This research will shed some light on an area of marketing that has been previously under-researched: form-based design in global innovation diffusion focusing on Asian countries and provide a more systematic approach to the empirical studies of form design issues in global marketing. This research extends the current design and innovation literature by examining the two dimensional types of design (visceral form and functionality) and potential moderators: degree of product innovation (RNP vs INP), consumer innovativeness, and consumer knowledge.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how developing country brand name and brand origin affect the customer’s evaluation of the brand in radically new high-tech products. Using processing fluency as a theoretical underpinning, this study can answer the following questions: first, does foreign brand name (developed vs developing Asian brand name) affect the customer’s attitude toward the brand? Second, does the brand origin (developed vs developing country) moderate the effect of foreign brand name on attitude toward the brand? Third, does the individual difference (knowledge and technological sophistication) matter in determining the brand origin and fit effect on willingness to buy?

A 2×2 between subject experiment was conducted in which two factors were manipulated: foreign brand name (developed: Japan vs developing: China) and brand origin (developed: Japan vs developing: China).

The fit between brand origin and brand name leads to better evaluation of the brand than no fit. On the other hand, for developing country brand origin (e.g. China), the brand naming effect is mitigated by enhanced processing fluency caused by fit, which leads to better evaluation of developing country brand. Fit effect is more pronounced for more knowledgeable consumers. Technologically more sophisticated consumers are more willing to buy the developing country brand origin than technologically less sophisticated consumers due to the processing fluency effect.

This paper introduces the two dimensions of foreign brand name (developed vs developing) and examines the interaction with the brand origin. This research fills the gap of under-researched area in brand naming literature, which is the effect of developing country brand naming on attitude toward the brand of radically new high-tech products. This research extends the previous literature by applying linguistic mechanism, processing fluency to examine the Asian brand naming including emerging market. This research makes an important theoretical contribution by identifying an underlying individual-level construct, “knowledge” and “technological sophistication,” which explains and influences the effects of brand name and brand origin on willingness to buy the brand.