Updated: Jun 30, 2024
The project conducted a survey to firms active or potentially interested in marine renewable energies, with a view to identify the firms that are forming the new industrial value chain and to obtain information of their activities and perceptions. A document was produced summarizing the results of the questionnaire that was sent to the respondents. This document is only available in Portuguese.
Hélder Santos, Margarida Fontes, Teresa Sá Marques, Marcelo Torres
31st APDR Congress "Regional Innovation Ecosystems and Sustainable Development" | Polytechnic University of Leiria
Abstract
Purpose | The paper addresses the “disturbing” effects that new generations of technology can introduce in the early trajectory of a regional industrial path built around wind offshore technology, focusing on the dimensions along which such disturbance occurs and the actors’ responses to them.
We look at the case of the industry formed around wind energy technology. The first generation – onshore wind - drove the development of new industrial paths in some regions. The introduction of new generations (fixed & floating offshore wind) that increasingly diverge from the onshore technology, leading to significant changes in the industry concerned with their production and deployment (Van Der Loos et al., 2020).
It is argued that the emergence of the new technology generations potentially produced disturbance along several dimensions (Gong & Binz, 2023) that could affect the industrial and institutional configuration of the wind energy path. The industrial development required, not only innovation activity in the existing manufacturing industry, but also the involvement of a new set of industries. The location at sea made proximity to the natural resource more pertinent, required new infrastructures, demanded regulatory changes and raised new acceptance issues (MacKinnon et al., 2019). Thus path-disturbance would occur at different assets level and actors’ agency.
The paper empirically analyses the case of Portugal, which developed an onshore wind energy (Bento & Fontes, 2015) and has engaged early in the experimentation with the new generation of floating offshore wind (Castro-Santos et al., 2020).
Methodology/Approach | The empirical analysis combines secondary data - on the structure of the onshore industry and on the experimental activities aiming at the early development of floating offshore wind - and interviews with a diverse range of actors (from the existing path; key actors that were early drivers; newcomers from other industries / areas of activity; policy makers at different governance levels; etc). Using secondary data, we map and compare the onshore industry core structure and the emerging configuration that results from floating experimental activities. Based on the interviews, we go in greater depth into the processes underway.
Expected Results | The analysis enables us to assess actor overlaps, as well as the extent and type of new actor entry. It also reveals the attitude of actors towards the potential for disturbance and their motivations and action to generate opportunities emerging from the disturbance. This research provides insights into the dimensions on which the involvement (or the willingness to get involved) with the new technology generation is inducing disturbances, and into actors’ agency in these processes.
Keywords | Path disturbing, path development, wind energy.
Cristina de Sousa, Margarida Fontes, Oscarina Conceição
7ª Edição do Workshop Dinâmicas Socioeconómicas e Territoriais Contemporâneas
Marine renewable energy technologies (MRET) have the potential to become an important source of clean energy and, simultaneously, contribute to the revitalisation of other sectors (Fontes et al, 2021). The realization of such potential requires the construction of a new industrial value chain that combines the competences associated with the new technologies with complementary resources and competences present in the existing industry (Makitie et al, 2018).
The involvement of established firms, as suppliers or co-developers is thus critical, but can be problematic. Firms tend to resist engaging with immature technologies and their promoters, given the technical and market uncertainty and the lack of legitimacy, as well as their own lack of competences in the new field (Ansari and Kropp, 2012; Cohen and Levinthal, 1990). However, declining markets or limited opportunities for growth in the existing ones, may lead firms to search for opportunities of diversification, along with their existing business (Helfat and Eisenhardt, 2004). Firms may also try to keep an eye on new (competitive) technologies, through an early engagement (Dyerson and Pilkington 2005), which can support future entry strategies.
It is therefore important to understand how established firms can be mobilised to support MRET development, through diversification into the emerging field. Corporate diversification strategies are used to pursue growth opportunities in other markets (Wiersema and Beck, 2017). Firms can introduce their current product/service portfolio in new markets, or to follow an innovation strategy where they adapt their current product/service to the new market or even develop a new set of products/services for that market (Penrose 1995; Helfat and Eisenhardt, 2004). The choice between these different diversification strategies may be influenced by the relatedness between the company’s current resources and competence and the ones demanded by the new markets (Lüthge, 2020). Moreover, these different diversification strategies may require different types of investments/business changes and raise specific challenges.
This paper focuses on companies from sectors potentially relevant for MRET that are willing to enter this new market and aims to understand how companies see: the opportunities to become engaged with the new market through different diversification strategies; the implications of such engagement for the firm’s business; and the problems that may arise.
For this we conduct empirical research on the case of MRET in Portugal, based on a questionnaire survey. The analysis addresses 119 companies not yet involved with MRET but that affirmed to be willing to enter this market in the future, which are inquired about their perceptions on the requirements of that entry. In the case of these companies, engagement with MRET may prove to be an opportunity for innovation and business diversification (Bento et al, 2021), but for such potential to be achieved it is necessary to understand the business changes and the difficulties that this strategic move may entail.
The results provide important insights into how to motivate and support companies whose contribution is critical to the development of a new industrial value chain, being relevant to assist the formulation of policies targeting them.
Keywords: new industrial value chain; diversification strategies; marine renewable energy technologies; firms’ perceptions