Knowledge Integration and Innovation

Technology-based firms continue to compete primarily on innovation and are continuously required to present new solutions to an exacting market. As technological complexity and specialization intensifies firms increasingly need to integrate and co-ordinate knowledge by means of project groups diversified organizations inter-organizational partnerships and strategic alliances. Innovation processes have progressively become interdisciplinary collaborative inter-organizational and international and a firm''s ability to synthesize knowledge across disciplines organizations and geographical locations has a major influence on its viability and success. This book demonstrates how knowledge integration is crucial in facilitating innovation within modern firms. It provides original detailed empirical studies of prerequisites mechanisms and outcomes of knowledge integration processes on several organizational levels from key individuals projects and internal organizations to collaboration between firms. It stresses the need to understand knowledge integration as a multi-level phenomenon which requires a broad repertoire of organizational and technical means. It further clarifies the need for strong internal capabilities for exploiting external knowledge reveals how costs of knowledge integration affect outcomes and strategic decisions and discusses the managerial implications of fostering knowledge integration providing practical guidance and support for managers of knowledge integration in high-technology enterprises.