Beyond local search: boundary‐spanning, exploration, and impact in the optical disk industry

Lori Rosenkopf and Atul Nerkar

Strategic Management Journal, 2001, vol. 22, issue 4, 287-306

Abstract: Recognition of the firm's tendency toward local search has given rise to concepts celebrating exploration that overcomes this tendency. To move beyond local search requires that exploration span some boundary, be it organizational or technological. While several studies have encouraged boundary‐spanning exploration, few have considered both types of boundaries systematically. In doing so, we create a typology of exploration behaviors: local exploration spans neither boundary, external boundary‐spanning exploration spans the firm boundary only, internal boundary‐spanning exploration spans the technological boundary only, and radical exploration spans both boundaries. Using this typology, we analyze the impact of knowledge generated by these different types of exploration on subsequent technological evolution. In our study of patenting activity in optical disk technology, we find that exploration that does not span organizational boundaries consistently generates lower impact on subsequent technological evolution. In addition, we find that the impact of exploration on subsequent technological evolution within the optical disk domain is highest when the exploration spans organizational boundaries but not technological boundaries. At the same time, we find that the impact of exploration on subsequent technological development beyond the optical disk domain is greatest when exploration spans both organizational and technological boundaries. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Date: 2001
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (573)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.160

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:stratm:v:22:y:2001:i:4:p:287-306

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0143-2095

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Strategic Management Journal from Wiley Blackwell
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().