Innovation in Developing Countries: Lessons from Vietnam and Laos

✍ Scribed by Nobuaki Matsunaga

• Publisher: Springer Singapore
• Year: 2019
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 141
• Series: Kobe University Monograph Series in Social Science Research
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

The main focus of this book is innovation for developing countries: what is the innovation for, what are the current conditions of the innovation, and how to effectively innovate in developing economies. It contains the latest insights and analyses of innovation based on intensive interviews as well as primary and secondary data of manufacturing firms in developing countries, Vietnam and Laos in particular. Innovation requires something new. Integration of deep understanding of innovation and econometric analyses are a “new combination” in this book, which contrasts with other, similar books in the field. This new approach may benefit policy makers as well as scholars and firms in poor countries.

The main points of the book are summarized as follows: First, for most poor countries “learning innovation” is considered the key to economic growth rather than “leading-edge innovation”, which is a more popular theme in similar books on innovation. Second, an overwhelming majority of innovations currently used in poor countries are developed in advanced countries, so technology transfer and learning from the latter are a fundamental source of innovation in the former. Third, a surprisingly high rate of firms (around 50%) reported that they introduced new or significantly improved products or processes in poor countries, and this high innovation rate is a great benefit to be enhanced by government policies. Fourth, the common factors driving innovation of manufacturing firms in Vietnam and Laos are (1) human capital, (2) social capital, and (3) innovation in the past. Fifth, the impact of innovation on firm performance is found to be mixed in these countries. Sixth, so far almost all studies on innovation have focused on product or process innovation, but additional light is shed here on organizational innovation.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter ....Pages i-xviii
Introduction to Innovation (Nobuaki Matsunaga)....Pages 1-22
Product and Process Innovation of Micro, Small and Medium Manufacturing Enterprises in Vietnam (Trang Thi Thu Pham, Nobuaki Matsunaga)....Pages 23-51
Entrepreneurial Human Capital, Innovation and Productivity in Small and Medium Manufacturing Enterprises in Vietnam (Souksavanh Vixathep, Van Khoi Luong, Nobuaki Matsunaga)....Pages 53-76
Organisational Innovation by Manufacturing SMEs in Vietnam (Kana Haraguchi)....Pages 77-98
Human Capital, Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Micro and Small Businesses in Laos (Souksavanh Vixathep, Alay Phonvisay)....Pages 99-121
Conclusions (Nobuaki Matsunaga)....Pages 123-126
Back Matter ....Pages 127-129

✦ Subjects

Economics; Development Economics; R & D/Technology Policy; Economic Growth; Political Economy/Economic Policy; Asian Economics