A dinâmica de inovação na firma e seus resultados no setor de calçados brasileiro

Abstract

The Brazilian footwear industry, in the recent period, has suffered difficulties in terms of production, productivity and exportation. The indicators pointed to a loss of competitiveness, especially in leather industry. This loss of competitiveness becomes deeper when compared to the performance of Asian countries. It is important to seek for a new position in the international trade, where not only the growth of foreign trade, but also the domestic production, could be define by productivity gains, competitiveness strategies and innovation activities. In this way, this work aims to relate the dynamics of innovation with the internal characteristics of Brazilian footwear companies, observing the impacts of these innovations. For this, this work used primary data extracted from a field survey, through a semi-open questionnaire applied to 59 associated companies of Abicalçados, which represent approximately 40% of the national production. By means of two statistical methods, chi-square test and factorial analysis, this work arrived at answers that characterize that the companies that made process innovations have a better performance of their production and a continuous export activity. It was also verified that the footwear companies of this study, who made product innovations, perceive greater facilities in the opening of new consumer markets and in the maintenance of their participation in the market. At the same time, it is concluded that the company's process innovations can maintain them in the international market (that is, it keeps them exporting). However, product innovations combined with process innovations open new markets for these same companies. Additionally, it has been shown that companies that work primarily with leather are performing less process innovations than companies that work mainly with plastic / rubber, and, due to the lack of innovations in process, companies that mainly use the leather input, may be reflecting the low production and low export performance of the same.