Knowledge Compensation in the German Automobile Industry

Abstract

In studies looking at firm survival over the industry life cycle knowledge is one of the most important determinants. Different kinds of knowledge, namely post-entry experience, pre-entry experience, and knowledge acquired by innovative activity positively influence the sur-vival chances. This paper investigates how the kinds of knowledge are able to compensate each other. Therefore, a statistical survival analysis is performed for the German automobile industry (1886-1939) which applies an estimation approach that links instrumental variables with the Cox regression. The results highlight that innovative activity is able to compensate for lacking post-entry experience, supporting Schumpeterian creative destruction.