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Climbing the value chain: strategies to create a new product development capability in mature SMEs
journal contribution
posted on 2017-09-04, 16:12 authored by Hannah Noke, Mathew HughesPURPOSE. Increasing productivity gaps and declining manufacturing bases create complex challenges for mature small to medium enterprises (SMEs). One solution advocated by academia is to reposition along the value chain – moving to a position of greater value. The purpose of this paper is to examine strategies used by firms to reposition through creating a new product development (NPD) capability. In doing so, the paper seeks to resolve gaps in extant literature on NPD in mature SMEs.
DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH. An exploratory approach is taken, analysing in‐depth case studies of three mature UK manufacturing SMEs.
FINDINGS. Four strategic approaches to enable the creation of a NPD capability (strategic alliances, licensing key technologies and ideas, outsourcing and deploying an internal development process) are found. Each may facilitate an SME to reposition but the findings highlight that these strategies are not mutually exclusive as different combinations were employed to accelerate and leverage change.
RESEARCH LIMITATIONS/IMPLICATIONS. Limited number of case studies constrains wider understanding despite providing richness. The findings highlight four different strategies for repositioning but there may be other routes.
PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS. Deeper understanding of how to climb the value chain, providing valuable lessons for mature SMEs facing a need to reposition to generate new growth opportunities.
ORIGINALITY/VALUE. The paper provides an understanding of how mature manufacturers utilise different strategies to overcome resource constraints and generate a NPD capability to assist in repositioning. This resolves weaknesses in current literature that so far have not adequately examined the process of shaping a NPD capability and the strategies used to reposition.
History
School
- Business and Economics
Department
- Business
Published in
International Journal of Operations and Production ManagementVolume
30Issue
2Pages
132 - 154Citation
NOKE, H. and HUGHES, M., 2010. Climbing the value chain: strategies to create a new product development capability in mature SMEs. International Journal of Operations and Production Management, 30 (2), pp.132-154.Publisher
© EmeraldVersion
- AM (Accepted Manuscript)
Publisher statement
This work is made available according to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/Publication date
2010ISSN
0144-3577Publisher version
Language
- en