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Research Article

Analysis of Innovation Activity Types in Korean Service Firms Using Two-Step Cluster Analysis

Kang, Ingyu1 · Kim, Jaeyun2

1 Korea Institute for Industrial Research, 2 Chonnam National University

Published: January 2021 · Vol. 50 No. 6 · pp. 1711-1732

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17287/kmr.2021.50.6.1711

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Abstract

We classified the types of innovative activities of Korean service enterprises with a two-stage clustering method using the Ward and K-means methods, and analyzed the characteristics of each type. The innovation types of Korean service companies were classified into three types: internal concentration, market concentration, and opportunity exploration. The proportion of service enterprises according to the three types of innovation was 65.9%, 17.2% and 16.8% in 2014, 7.3%, 21.3% and 71.4% in 2016, and 19.8%, 18.3% and 61.9% in 2018. The proportion of internal concentration decreased, the proportion of market concentration remained, and the proportion of opportunity exploration increased. In addition, we analyzed the characteristics of each type of innovation activity in three aspects: input, process and outcome. Korean service enterprises were found to invest the most in internal R&D, while market concentration and opportunity exploration types were analyzed to carry out similar types of innovative activities. The type of innovation that adopted the most process innovation techniques was opportunity exploration, and the number of patent applications, opportunity exploration companies performed the most actively, but were not statistically significant. The results of this study are expected to be used as a basis for in-depth research into innovative activities of service enterprises.
Keywords: 2-step clusteringservice enterprisesinnovationK-meansWard