A decade after their introduction, approximately three-quarters of a million European Registered Community Designs (RCDs) have been filed, and recent court cases suggest firms regard them as important for competition. This paper reviews design protection in the European Union, discusses this...

This paper explores the use of specialist knowledge providers as sources of information in the innovation activities of manufacturing and service firms. Specialist knowledge providers are consultancies, private research organisations and the public science-base (i.e., universities and the...

Analysing survey data concerning the innovation orientations of 2500 European firms, this paper uses the exploratory statistical technique of multiple correspondence analysis to identify three distinct modes of innovation: a product-research mode; a process-technologies mode; and an...