Cooperative research and development: who participates and in which industries do projects take place?

• Published in: Research policy Vol. 30; no. 7; pp. 993 - 1018
• Main Author: Sakakibara, Mariko
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Amsterdam Elsevier B.V 01-08-2001; Elsevier; Elsevier Sequoia S.A
• Series: Research Policy
• Subjects: Appropriability; Consortia; Diversification; Industrial policy; Japan; R&D; R&D consortia; Research & development; Statistical analysis; Studies; Japan; R&D consortia; Diversification; Industrial policy; Japan; Appropriability
• ISSN: 0048-7333; 1873-7625
• DOI: 10.1016/S0048-7333(00)00127-X

This article identifies the characteristics of industry categories to which cooperative R&D participants belong and in which cooperative R&D projects occur, while focusing on the systematic linkages between these categories. The analysis is based upon 186 Japanese government-sponsored R&D consortia with 627 participants spanning three decades. The motives for cooperative R&D are found to be analogous to the motives for diversification. The results show that: firms in profitable or oligopolistic industries are motivated to form cooperative R&D projects in industries which have higher growth rates than their own industries (except in the 1960s); firms in R&D-intensive industries conduct cooperative R&D projects in order to enter R&D-intensive industries; and, projects tend to be formed in industries which have a strong vertical relationship with the participants. There is evidence that these government-sponsored cooperative R&D projects tend to occur in industries with a large minimum efficient scale in R&D in the 1970s, though this tendency is much weaker or non-existent in other decades. There is no evidence that projects tend to occur in industries which have appropriability problems. On the contrary, there is evidence in the 1970s that projects were formed in industries with strong appropriability conditions.