Mapping the evolution, current state of affairs and future research direction of managing cross-border knowledge for innovation

This paper systematically reviews the relationship between cross-border knowledge flows and innovation across several literature strands in international business, management, strategy and innovation. We contribute to the international business literature by documenting, for the first time, the evolving nature of the relationship between cross-border knowledge flows and innovation, across several themes. In particular, our unique reviewing technique allows us to uncover and map in detail how the cross-disciplinary literature strands have explored the topic in the past, how it has developed to our current level of understanding as well as giving insights into where the literature is likely to head and develop in the future. Our numerous findings cover both empirical and conceptual developments, which in turn have their origins partly in other disciplines. Knowing the interrelationships between disciplines on this topic offers us a rare insight into the complex nature of previous and ongoing research from which we draw a number of important implications for theory, practice as well as future avenues for research, through five pivotal areas, to which we contribute.