Innovation in an unfavorable context: Local mining suppliers in Peru
Oswaldo Molina
Resources Policy, 2018, vol. 58, issue C, 34-48
Abstract:
Recent changes in the mining industry have opened new opportunities for technological upgrading by local suppliers in developing countries. This paper explores the factors that foster or hinder innovation in such a context. We employ a case study methodology to analyze a sample of Peruvian mining contractors that integrated into knowledge-intensive stages of the value chain in recent years. Our main findings reveal that technological efforts are largely driven by the mining companies’ demands, which favor incumbent over emergent suppliers due to their experience in the local market. In order to integrate into the more knowledge-intensive stages of the value chain, we identified that these firms followed two strategies: (i) identification of local-specific market niches where foreign competition is scarce, and (ii) partnerships with global suppliers and specialization in high-quality and customized complementary services. Still, all the suppliers in the sample are very new in technologically complex activities, and their innovations remain limited from a global perspective. Our findings suggest that this is partly due to a weak institutional setting, scarce support from external organizations, and limited coordination channels in the sector.
Keywords: O13; O32; Mining; Peru; Innovation; Value chain; Suppliers; Incumbent firms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)
Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S030142071730123X
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
Related works:
Working Paper: Innovation in an Unfavorable Context: Local Mining Suppliers in Peru (2017) 
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:eee:jrpoli:v:58:y:2018:i:c:p:34-48
DOI: 10.1016/j.resourpol.2017.10.011
Access Statistics for this article
Resources Policy is currently edited by R. G. Eggert
More articles in Resources Policy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().