Why Do Firms Implement Responsible Innovation? The Case of Emerging Technologies in South Korea

Abstract

With the rise of responsible innovation (RI) initiatives in firms that commercialize innovation in recent years, experts have argued that in order for RI to succeed, practical issues must be considered. Accordingly, this paper explores RI from the perspective of Korean emerging technology development firms. Although social benefits are expected from RI, which aims to reduce the side effects of innovations for society, the implementation of RI requires changing firms’ existing rules and routines. Therefore, predicting benefits and costs from the firm’s perspective can shed light on the likelihood that RI will succeed. In this study, through an expert survey, the relative weights of RI-related benefit criteria (technological level, economic performance, and public contribution) and cost criteria (anticipation, reflexivity, inclusion, and responsiveness) were analyzed. On this basis, trends in priorities for RI levels were evaluated from present and future perspectives. Unexpectedly, firms recognized that even if constraints such as RI impose greater costs, they will eventually bring greater benefits. This finding indicates that innovation induced by RI overcomes obstacles, offsets costs, and then finally increases firms’ competitiveness, and that firms are willing to do good for society through RI. In the long term, a firm’s ethical activities may eventually result in improved performance by its management. Therefore, it can be concluded that, even if RI is enforced in a compulsory manner, it is highly likely that it can be well established and promoted even in firms that consider profit first.

Appendices

Appendix 1: Methodology

In this appendix, the detailed calculation process of the AHP method used in this paper was described (Dweiri et al. 2016). In order to choose the best implementation of RI in business context using AHP, four stages are developed as shown in Table 2. Each criterion is ranked based on respondents’ opinions using surveys. Respondents were asked to perform pair-wise comparison of the criteria based on the importance scale shown in Table 9.

Table 9 Importance scale of factors in pair-wise comparison

Then for each general criterion or sub-criterion as well as alternatives (the level of RI) is identified in the level of hierarchy based on respondents’ opinions shown in Figs. 2 and 3. In this study, we consider four levels of RI for ranking and Table 1 will provide information about levels of RI. At first, general criteria for benefits in the present perspective were evaluated. Each pair of the comparison matrix evaluated by the respondent is integrated by geometric means to form a single pair comparison matrix, as shown in Table 10.

Table 10 Respondents opinions for pair-wise comparison for general criteria for benefits in the present

Table 10 is represented in matrix A and will be used to illustrate how AHP works.

$${\text{A}} = \left[ { \begin{array}{*{20}c} 1 & {0.649} & {2.278} \\ {1/0.649} & 1 & {3.071} \\ {1/2.278} & {1/3.071} & 1 \\ \end{array} } \right]$$

The sum of the columns in ${\text{A}} = \left( { 2.979\quad 1.975\quad 6.350} \right).$

A normalized matrix N is obtained by dividing each element of the matrix A by the sum of the respective column.

$${\text{N}} = \left[ { \begin{array}{*{20}c} {0.336} & {0.329} & {0.359} \\ {0.517} & {0.506} & {0.484} \\ {0.147} & {0.165} & {0.157} \\ \end{array} } \right]$$

To find the weight of each criterion, a matrix W is obtained by calculating the average for each row of the matrix N.

$$W = \left[ {\begin{array}{*{20}c} {w_{1} = \frac{0.336 + 0.329 + 0.359}{3} = 0.341} \\ {w_{2} = \frac{0.517 + 0.506 + 0.484}{3} = 0.502} \\ {w_{3} = \frac{0.147 + 0.165 + 0.157}{3} = 0.157} \\ \end{array} } \right] = \left[ {\begin{array}{*{20}c} {0.341} \\ {0.502} \\ {0.157} \\ \end{array} } \right]$$

Notice that $\sum W_{i} = 1.000$.

As a result, the relative weights of general criteria “technical level 0.341”, “economic performance 0.502”, “public contribution 0.157” were described in the first row of Table 4.

Pair-wise comparisons were also used to rank the sets of sub-criteria with respect to their associated main criterion. The four levels of RI were also ranked based on the sub-criteria using the same methodology and the results are shown in Table 4. In the same way as above, identification for the benefit (10 years in the future) and the cost (present, 10 years in the future) and choosing the best implementation of RI (alternatives) are shown Tables 5, 6, and 7. The above mentioned results are based on the qualitative judgement of emerging technologies experts. Their judgments were also performed on the web-based I MAKE IT software (http://imakeit.kr).

Appendix 2: Survey

• Start survey: Please evaluate these questions at the current point (short term).

  • First, please answer the questions focusing on benefits.

Q1

The current assessment identifies the relative importance of the project’s goal, “Determine how RI will apply in the firm: Benefits.” Please select which criterion (standard) is relatively more important.

Criteria	Importance ⟵								Equal	⟶ Importance								Criteria
	Extreme importance		Demonstrated importance		Essential or strong		Moderate importance				Moderate importance		Essential or strong		Demonstrated importance		Extreme importance
	(9)	(8)	(7)	(6)	(5)	(4)	(3)	(2)	(1)	(2)	(3)	(4)	(5)	(6)	(7)	(8)	(9)
Technological level																		Economic performance
Technological level																		Public contribution
Economic performance																		Public contribution

Q2

From the “technical level” point of view, please select which criterion (standard) is relatively more important.

Criteria	(9)	(8)	(7)	(6)	(5)	(4)	(3)	(2)	(1)	(2)	(3)	(4)	(5)	(6)	(7)	(8)	(9)	Criteria
Technological excellence																		Social acceptability of technology

Q3

From the perspective of “technological excellence,” which alternative do you think is more appropriate?

Criteria	(9)	(8)	(7)	(6)	(5)	(4)	(3)	(2)	(1)	(2)	(3)	(4)	(5)	(6)	(7)	(8)	(9)	Criteria
Low level																		Intermediate
Low level																		High
Low level																		Very high
Intermediate																		High
Intermediate																		Very high
High																		Very high

In the same way as above, respondents evaluate the last questions for the benefits in the present.

• Next, the following questions focus on costs.

Q11

The current assessment determines the relative importance of the project’s goal, “Determine how RI will apply to the firm: Cost.” Please select which criterion (standard) is relatively more important.

Criteria	(9)	(8)	(7)	(6)	(5)	(4)	(3)	(2)	(1)	(2)	(3)	(4)	(5)	(6)	(7)	(8)	(9)	Criteria
Anticipation																		Reflexivity
Anticipation																		Inclusion
Anticipation																		Responsiveness
Reflexivity																		Inclusion
Reflexivity																		Responsiveness
Inclusion																		Responsiveness

Q12

From the perspective of “anticipation,” please select which item (baseline) is relatively more important.

Criteria	(9)	(8)	(7)	(6)	(5)	(4)	(3)	(2)	(1)	(2)	(3)	(4)	(5)	(6)	(7)	(8)	(9)	Criteria
Technological forecasting and technological exploration																		Certification of technology

Q13

From the perspective of “technical forecasting and technology exploration,” which alternative do you think is more appropriate?

Criteria	(9)	(8)	(7)	(6)	(5)	(4)	(3)	(2)	(1)	(2)	(3)	(4)	(5)	(6)	(7)	(8)	(9)	Criteria
Low level																		Intermediate
Low level																		High
Low level																		Very high
Intermediate																		High
Intermediate																		Very high
High																		Very high

In the same way as above, respondents evaluate the last questions for the costs in the present.

• Start survey: Please evaluate at the time point of 10 years later (long term).

In the same way as above, respondents evaluate the last questions for the benefits and costs in the future.