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Catching up and leapfrogging in a high-tech manufacturing industry: towards a firm-level taxonomy of knowledge accumulation

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Knowledge Management Research & Practice

Abstract

Latecomer firms from emerging economies upgrade their technological capabilities by providing original equipment manufacturer (OEM) services to multi-national enterprises from advanced countries and extend their role across the global value chains. Existing firm-level taxonomies of knowledge accumulation cannot explain why most latecomer firms fail to transit to advanced levels in high-tech manufacturing industries. The proposed framework combines firm-level taxonomy of knowledge accumulation with catch-up trajectory to argue that, under the knowledge regime of a high-tech manufacturing industry, latecomers’ learning experience differs from those as posited by previous studies. Using the integrated circuit industry as the empirical anchor, this paper shows that firms undergo ‘critical transition’ in learning which involves sustainable innovative capacity and momentum-generation to reach the advanced level. It shows how OEMs build knowledge to leapfrog incumbents without competing with their branded customers. Throughout the process, inter-firm collaboration and open innovation are critical sources of knowledge.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

    Xiao-Shan Yap & Rajah Rasiah

  2. Eawag, Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, Dübendorf, Switzerland

    Xiao-Shan Yap

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  1. Xiao-Shan Yap
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  2. Rajah Rasiah
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Correspondence to Xiao-Shan Yap.

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Yap, XS., Rasiah, R. Catching up and leapfrogging in a high-tech manufacturing industry: towards a firm-level taxonomy of knowledge accumulation. Knowl Manage Res Pract 15, 114–129 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1057/kmrp.2015.21

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