Innovation networks: building and cooperation management for innovation

Abstract

This article presents a conceptual framework of an innovation network with multiple regional actors. This network is formalized in an associative organization with defined belonging criteria. Differently from most innovation networks in the literature, the conceptual framework put forward in this article features an innovation network with a horizontal structure, induced by the government, having a centralized coordination run by the firms. To illustrate the conceptual framework suggested to characterize an Induced Horizontal Innovation Network (IHIN), we present a suppliers network in the oil and gas industry in the south of Brazil, Rede Petro-RS. The article aims to show the importance of a coordination structure specific for the management and incentive of cooperative relations inside an innovation network as well as the importance of the role played by the government in the inducement of innovation networks, not only by providing incentives to these arrangements, but also acting directly in the coordination process of the network activities. Two major issues are crucial for the success of this type of interorganizational arrangement: legitimacy building of the coordination structure and the institutionalization of cooperation routines.