The purpose of the paper is to explore how the perceived relationship quality is related to the innovation capacity in chains of the traditional food sector. Based on suggestions from theory and previous studies, empirical evidence is drawn from a survey of 90 traditional food chains including...

Networks become increasingly important as external sources of innovation for firms. Through networks firms get in contact with different actors with whom they can exchange information and collaborate. A firm’s ability to be a successful network actor depends on its network competence. This...

Organizations no longer compete as independent entities, but as chains (Christopher, 1998; Cox, 1999; Lambert, Cooper, 2000). Consequently, chain strategies became more important in creating competitive advantage (Vickery et al., 2003; Gunasekaran et al., 2004). Despite the growing recognition of the...