ABSTRACT
In analyses of the strategies and learning orientations of food and beverage companies (hereafter F & B), incremental product innovations and imitations is a recurrent theme. Menrad (2004) concludes the following based on his comprehensive analysis of the European, and in particular the German, F & B industry: “Given the high numbers of product and process innovations, several studies have shown that radical innovations are very rare in the food industry” (p. 23). Furthermore, according to Stewart-Knox and Mitchell (2003), “Fear of new product failure has resulted in low rates of innovation in the food industry with many companies preferring to re-develop old products to create new products in the attempt to increase success rates” (p. 62). A recent analysis by Alfranca, Rama, and von Tunzelmann (2004) of the innovative history of multinational F & B firms adds to this picture, “a relatively small core of persistent innovators and fringe of numerous single, and especially occasional, inventors direct technological change in the sector” (p. 611). The key question that forms the basis for the chapter has an up-spring in findings such as these. In addition, the key question has also a basis in that more research is asked for about top managers involvement in product innovation (hereafter PI).
