When Opportunity Meets Ability : The Moderating Effects of Prolific Inventors on Novel Drug Innovation Following Product Failure in Biotechnology

Through a longitudinal study of the product development portfolios of 457 US-based firms in the biotechnology industry, we investigate how prolific inventors shape a firm’s innovative direction following product development failure. Contrary to received wisdom, we argue and demonstrate that an increase in the number of prolific inventors is associated with a decrease in firm propensity to pursue novel product innovation following such failure. We further find that the presence of prolific inventors with greater collaborative strength and longer tenure negatively moderate the positive relationship between failure and the pursuit of novel product development. We discuss the implications of our results for existing research on learning from failure and strategic human capital