Trajectories of innovation: A new approach to studying innovation performance

Innovation can be a strategy for firms to achieve performance objectives. This specific use of innovation, particularly in technology, has aroused the interest of academics to understand the processes of introducing innovations to a company over time. This research aims to identify the most frequent innovation paths used by companies and their determinants. Using group-based trajectory models, this work estimates different trajectories over time and assigns each company a probability of belonging to each trajectory, and this probability indicates the group to which the firm belongs. The research data were obtained from the Technological Development and Innovation Survey; all manufacturing companies in Colombia participate in this survey every two years, and the last five waves from the past 10 years were used. In total, usable data from 3403 companies were analyzed. The results show three innovation paths related to the creation of new products. The results are discussed in this manuscript.