Shawn M. Carraher

COVID-19 is affecting the development of the global economy and threatening the survival of SMEs worldwide. In light of the current situation, this paper examines the factors affecting product and process innovation in SMEs during the COVID-19 crisis. We carried out a simple random sample of 185 SME entrepreneurs in Ardakan, Iran, using a multivariate regression analysis. The results showed that experience is one of the most important factors affecting innovation. Organization size and age were negatively associated with process innovation during the current crisis. Moreover, the findings reveal that training to facilitate cooperation as well as higher commitment to R&D can lead to greater innovation. An important conclusion is that, during the COVID-19 pandemic, government efforts to encourage SMEs to create new products helped them to withstand the crisis. The study suggests that, during the COVID-19 crisis, embracing innovation as a core organizational value helped SMEs to remain competitive.

This article responds to recent calls for organizational research to address larger, more globally relevant questions and to pay attention to history, by analyzing the crucial debate over intellectual property rights (IPR) between the United States and China. Despite the recent US position, the United States has not always been a leading IPR advocate. Rather, it was a leading IPR violator during the nineteenth century. An institution-based view of IPR history suggests that both the US refusal to protect foreign IPR in the nineteenth century and the current Chinese lack of enthusiasm to meet US IPR demands represent rational choices. However, as cost-benefit considerations change institutional transitions are possible. We predict that to the same extent the United States voluntarily agreed to strengthen IPR protection when its economy became sufficiently innovation-driven, China will similarly improve its IPR protection.