Towards a Taxonomy of Firms Engaged in International R&D Networks: an Evaluation of the Spanish Participation in Eureka

Innovation is increasingly becoming an internationalized process and a strategy that has recently been playing a central role in this scenario is that of R&D collaboration. To assess the outcomes of this strategy we develop an evaluation of Eureka Programme’s impact for the case of Spanish companies participating in this initiative and that had projects finished in the period 2000-2005. A total of 77 firms were assessed through statistical association methods and cluster analysis. Company size, Role in the Project, Firm Sector and R&D intensity are significantly associated with the projects’ impacts on Spanish participants. A consistent taxonomy is offered in which three clusters are built: (1) Risky Innovators; (2) Inventors; and (3) Consistent Innovators