Henry van der Wiel
| Date of Ph.D. defense: | 14 April 2010 |
| Title of thesis: | Competion and Innovation: Together a Tricky Rollercoaster for Productivity |
| ISBN: | 978 90 5668 250 7 |
| Promotor: | Prof.dr. J. Boone |
Abstract:
This PhD thesis deals with competition and innovation as drivers of productivity. According to literature, competition and innovation seem to be indivisibly connected to each other. Competition stimulates innovation by firms, and firms that innovate try to beat their competitors otherwise they will be swallowed by them. Competition as well as innovation are main drivers of productivity growth, but according to recent insights a trade-off may exist between these drivers. In fact, the relationship could look like an inverted U suggesting that competition is not always positively correlated with innovation. If competition is too intense, it has a negative effect on innovation (and productivity).
This thesis has two main goals. First, it sheds more light on how to measure competition on product markets. In that respect, it elaborates on a new competition measure, the profit elasticity (PE). Chapter 2 extensively discusses this indicator and explicitly focus on what is meant by 'competition'. Chapter 3 provides a guide for researchers how to measure PE in practice.
The second goal of this thesis is to analyze the relationship between competition, innovation and productivity. As empirical evidence for this relationship is hardly available for the Netherlands, chapter 4 fills this gap by using Dutch (aggregate) firm level data. Chapter 5 examines the link between competition and product innovation at the firm level. It particularly analyzes the effect of product differentiation related to making products less close substitutes, and hence making markets less competitive
Global / English