The Strength of Long Ties and the Weakness of Strong Ties: Knowledge diffusion through supply chain networks

Yasuyuki Todo, Petr Matous and Hiroyasu Inoue ()

Discussion papers from Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI)

Abstract: This paper examines the effect of the structure of supply chain networks on productivity and innovation capability through knowledge diffusion, using large firm-level panel data for Japan. We find that ties with distant suppliers improve productivity, as measured by sales per worker, possibly attributed to intermediates from distant firms embodying more diversified knowledge than from neighboring firms. Ties with neighboring clients also improve productivity, which may be a result of diffusion of disembodied knowledge from neighboring clients being more effective than from distant clients. By contrast, ties with distant suppliers and clients improve innovative capability, as measured by the number of patent applications, suggesting the importance of a diversity of knowledge from distant firms for innovation. In addition, the density of a firm's ego network, which is measured by how densely its supply chain partners transact with each other, is found to have a negative effect on productivity and innovative capability, implying knowledge redundancy in dense networks. Overall, our results emphasize the importance of diversified partners in knowledge diffusion through supply chain networks.

Pages: 40 pages
Date: 2015-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cse, nep-eff, nep-geo, nep-ino, nep-knm, nep-net, nep-soc and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.rieti.go.jp/jp/publications/dp/15e034.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: The strength of long ties and the weakness of strong ties: Knowledge diffusion through supply chain networks (2016)
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:eti:dpaper:15034

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Discussion papers from Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by TANIMOTO, Toko ().