INNOVATION AS A DETERMINANT OF THE COMPETITIVENESS OF POLISH ENTERPRISES
INNOVATION AS A DETERMINANT OF THE COMPETITIVENESS OF POLISH ENTERPRISES

Summary/Abstract: Research background: Global competition, fast and dynamic technological change and increasingly shorter product life cycles have changed the current environment of enterprises’ functioning. In order to compete, firms are obliged to introduce new technologies, products, services or organizational systems and are forced to seek competitive advantages in innovativeness. Technology transfer becomes a major opportunity to enhance competitiveness and innovativeness of enterprises. The use of technology transfer and implementation of innovations allows companies to meet the requirements of the market and international competition. This paper discusses innovation activity occurring in industrial enterprises in Poland at present. Purpose of the article: The aim of the article is to determine the level of innovativeness in gaining the competitive position of surveyed Polish enterprises. The purpose of the article is to determine the occurring innovation activity and the novelty level of innovations implemented in the group of surveyed firms. Methods: The study is based on a survey on industrial firms (n=100) located in Poland. Data was collected during 100 individual interviews with high- and medium-level managers of randomly selected companies. Findings & Value added: The research has determined the level of innovativeness in gaining the competitive position of the surveyed firms. As the survey showed, enterprises prevailed the range of implementation of material innovation - product and process. Rarely firms implement non-material innovations. The study pointed to low activity in the field of patenting and implementing innovations with a high level of novelty. According to the obtained results, there is a dominant introducing new form the companies side innovations, which causes low competitiveness of surveyed enterprises. These findings suggest that measurement of innovativeness in gaining the competitiveness should be developed. The findings support the need for Polish enterprises to participate in advanced forms of technology and knowledge procurement.

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