FIRM SIZE, RADICAL AND INCREMENTAL INNOVATION: A META-ANALYSIS BASED ON THE AWARENESS-MOTIVATION-CAPABILITY PERSPECTIVE

This study investigates the firm size-innovation puzzle through distinguishing radical from incremental innovation, and examining the country-level context (i.e., university–industry collaboration in R&D and competition intensity) that the firm size-innovation relationship is contingent on. The meta-analysis including 162 studies with 112,639 firms reveals that firm size can simultaneously benefit for radical and incremental innovations, while the measurement of firm size using the non-personnel indices can result in significant difference between the firm size-radical innovation and firm size-incremental innovation. Additionally, it is found that the positive relationship between firm size and radical innovation increases when university–industry collaboration in R&D and competition intensity is stronger. This study quantitatively summarises the relationship between firm size and radical/incremental innovation and updates the correlations reported in established literatures. Drawing on awareness-motivation-capability perspective, it takes an essential and frontier step in testing the country-level context that can influence the effect of firm size on innovation.