A foot in two camps or your undivided attention? The impact of intra- and inter-community collaboration on firm innovation performance

Many inter-organisational networks exhibit a community structure. However, the level of understanding of the effect of firms' embeddedness in a network community on their innovation performance is limited. This study attempts to fill this gap by investigating the impact of intra- and inter-community collaboration strength on firms' innovation performance, with patent data pertaining to the new-energy vehicle industry during the period from 2000 to 2017. The results show that, first, firms with moderate levels of intra-community collaboration strength achieve the greatest innovation performance, as these firms obtain rapid and efficient access to knowledge within their community. Second, firms with moderate levels of inter-community collaboration strength achieve the greatest innovation performance, as they acquire heterogeneous knowledge from outside the community. Third, the interaction of intra- and inter-community collaboration strength has a significant negative effect on firms' innovation performance. This finding suggests that simultaneously building collaborations inside and outside the community is not an ideal network strategy for firms to employ.