Non-R&D innovation: A neglected innovation approach for Chinese SMEs

As we all know, R&D has been the central focus of policy making and scholarly research in the field of innovation in the past decades, while non-R&D innovation and Innovative firms that do not perform R&D have largely been neglected by policy and academics. But as an integral part of innovation, non-R&D innovation does play an important part in enterprises´ innovation process, especially in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) whose R&D capabilities are very weak. So far, there are only few researches on non-R&D innovation, let alone the reasonable definition of non-R&D innovation. Based on existing innovation literatures, this paper gives a more clearly and reasonable definition of non-R&D innovation. Then, the paper puts forward four typical modes of non-R&D innovation with illustrative cases which indicate that non-R&D innovation is an effective innovation approach to the survival and development of SMEs.