내부 R&D투자와 외부 지식탐색 활용 영향요인: 전략, 역량 및 연구소

Technological innovation is important for firms to seize new business opportunities and strengthens technology competitiveness in existing product markets. According to widespread of open innovation, prior studies focused on the effects of external knowledge search activities on performance with many country contexts. Recently there has been a growing interest in key factors to increase external knowledge search activities with limited empirical studies. There is little studies on how firm characteristics have impact both on internal R&D investment and external knowledge search activities. Also there are little understanding on the dual roles of R&D center for internal R&D development and external knowledge search. This study examined the relationship of firm characteristics-technological pioneering strategy, technological capability and the existence of R&D center with internal R&D investment and external knowledge search. In addition, this paper investigated the interacting effects of R&D center and technological capability on internal R&D investment and external knowledge search. Based on the results of a large scale survey on Korean manufacturing SMEs, this paper tested key hypotheses. Technology pioneering strategy has a positive effect on internal R&D investment and external knowledge search. Firms to pursue first-to-local market strategy increase both internal R&D investment and external knowledge search. Firms to pursue first-to-global market only increase internal R&D investment. The higher the technological capability, the more positive the internal R&D investment and the external knowledge search. When firms have own R&D centers, they significantly increase intern R&D investment but have no significant relationshjps with external knowledge search. There are a positive interaction effects of R&D center and technological capability on internal R&D investment. In contrast to the hypothesis, there is a negative interaction effects of R&D center and technological capability on external knowledge search activities. The main findings of this study and implications are as follows. There are differences in knowledge creation methods according to the technology strategy. Firms to develop first-to-market technology rather than general technology are actively seeking to create knowledge both inside and outside. In the process of external cooperation for the world 's first technology development, it can act as an obstacle to search of external knowledge due to possibility of leakage of information or knowledge on new technology and innovations. Independent R&D center operations have a different impact on internal or external knowledge acquisition. It seems that the main functional role of the R&D center in Korean manufacturing SMEs focuses on the internal R&D development rather than external knowledge searches. It has little roles to access diverse information sources and create innovations. The interaction effect between the R&D center and the internal knowledge capability shows different results in internal R&D investment and external knowledge search. The R&D center with a high level of internal technology capability has a positive influence on internal R&D investment. This is because the securing of the technological capability through R&D center earns organizational legitimacy and top managers' attention to allocate more resources. On the other hand, the interaction effect between internal technology capability level and R&D center has a negative effect on external knowledge search. This may be due to resistance to external knowledge and technology by the R&D center's not-invented here (NIH) syndrome. It is also possible for R&D center to intentionally lower the use of external technologies when top managers have intents to reduce their internal R&D investment for internal R&D center that has excessive reliance on external technologies. Finally, this study presents theoretical and practical implications and explains the research limitations and future research directions.