Innovation

Firm-Level Upgrading in Developing Countries

In principle, firms in developing countries benefit from the fact that advanced technologies and products have already been developed in industrialized countries and can simply be adopted, a process often referred to as industrial upgrading.

Synthesis Paper
10 Mar 2020

Bottom-Up Idea Generation: Evidence from the Bangladeshi Garment Industry

In this project, Schreiber sets up suggestion boxes for 1,600 workers in a Bangladeshi garment factory and tests the efficacy of two cross-randomized voice-enhancing managerial interventions through an RCT.

Research Project
1 Dec 2019

Developing a “Product-Market Experimentation & Fit” Measurement Tool and Testing its Effectiveness via an RCT with Lean Start-up Entrepreneurs in Kenya and Uganda

This project aims to improve our understanding of ‘demand-side factors’ related to why some small firms succeed and scale-up, while others do not.

Research Project
1 Aug 2019

Facilitating Innovative Growth of Low-Cost Private Schools: Experimental Evidence from Pakistan

The primary objective of this project, by Khwaja, Das and Andrabi (2019) is to understand what factors constrain growth and innovation in Low-Cost Private Schools (LCPS) with an emphasis on alleviating financial and educational quality in enhancing constraints.

Research Note
24 Jun 2019

The Role of Industry and Economic Context in Open Innovation: Evidence from Nigeria

Using innovation survey data on a sample of UK manufacturing firms, Laursen and Salter (2006) documented a non-monotonous relationship between external search strategies and firm-level innovative performance.

Book Chapter
1 Jan 2019

Mitigating Market Frictions by Monitoring Employees in SMEs: A Field Experiment in Kenya’s Public Transport Sector

Schoenholzer, Kelley, Lane and Wagacha (2018) provide firms a new technology that delivers real-time information to the owner of the vehicle about the driver’s productivity and safety.

Research Note
7 Sep 2018

It Takes Two: Experimental Evidence on the Determinants of Technology Diffusion

Previous studies of peer-to-peer technology diffusion have primarily focused on the decision of potential adopters. Often equally relevant for observed diffusion is the willingness of incumbent adopters to actively share technology.

Research Note
18 Jan 2018

Monitoring and Intrinsic Motivation: Evidence from Liberia’s Trucking Firms

Severe information asymmetries are thought to make contracting particularly difficult within (and across) firms in developing countries.

Working Paper
19 Nov 2017

Horizontal and Vertical Polarization: Task-Specific Technological Change in a Multi-Sector Economy

Lee and Shin (2017) analyze the effect of technological change in a novel framework that integrates an economy's skill distribution with its occupational and industrial structure. Individuals become managers or workers based on their managerial vs.

Working Paper
21 Sep 2017

Organizational Barriers to Technology Adoption: Evidence from Soccer Ball Producers in Pakistan

This paper by Atkin, Chaudhry, Chaudry, Khandelwal, and Verhoogen (2017), published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics, studies technology adoption in a cluster of soccer-ball producers in Sialkot, Pakistan.

Journal Article
1 Aug 2017

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