Asymmetric Power of the Core: Technological Cooperation and Technological Competition in the Transnational Innovation Networks of Big Pharma

Cecilia Rikap

Review of International Political Economy, 2019, vol. 26, issue 5, 987-1021

Abstract: This article theoretically and empirically analyzes leader corporations’ innovation processes in contemporary capitalism. We highlight three characteristics: their transnational scope, the primacy of power or asymmetric relations exercised by leaders over the participants of their innovation circuits or networks, and the relevance of what we called technological competition and technological cooperation between leaders. Focusing on the latter, our theoretical contribution integrates the concepts of innovation circuit, global innovation network and modularity of knowledge production in order to elaborate a preliminary model for synthesizing leader’s technological competition and collaboration behaviors. This model is the general framework used for studying three big pharma’s innovation networks (Roche, Novartis and Pfizer). In particular, we study those networks by considering two outputs: scientific publications and patents. Network maps are constructed based on institutions’ co-occurrences, thus looking at who is co-authoring their publications and co-owning these corporations’ patents. We find that big pharmaceuticals co-produce together mainly generic knowledge modules, thus develop a strong technological cooperation. Simultaneously, to succeed in their technological competition they outsource stages of their innovation networks to subordinate institutions that, even if they contribute to achieve the innovation, will not be co-owners of the resulting patents, while big pharmaceuticals enjoy associated innovation rents.

Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09692290.2019.1620309 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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:taf:rripxx:v:26:y:2019:i:5:p:987-1021

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/rrip20

DOI: 10.1080/09692290.2019.1620309

Access Statistics for this article

Review of International Political Economy is currently edited by Gregory Chin, Juliet Johnson, Daniel Mügge, Kevin Gallagher, Ilene Grabel and Cornelia Woll

More articles in Review of International Political Economy from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().