Driving the electric bandwagon: The dynamics of incumbents' sustainable innovation
研究了汽车行业在位企业如何从个别行动转向全行业参与电动汽车创新，发现强制、规范和模仿压力共同推动电动汽车成为技术战略核心，但不同企业的战略动机差异很大。
Abstract Given that entire industries face sustainability challenges, it is important to understand the dynamics that lead “firms‐in‐an‐industry” to engage in sustainable product innovation. To provide more insight into the question of how innovation activities spread from individual firm action to an industry‐wide engagement, this paper examines the automobile industry and the development of electric vehicles (EVs). The analysis covers automobile incumbents over a crucial decade for EV development in the industry, focusing on the different strategic motives that especially the so‐called “first movers” used to justify their earlier engagement. We find that EVs became a core pillar of the incumbents' technology strategies through a combination of coercive, normative, and mimetic pressures. Yet, the strategic motives to engage in EVs stayed poles apart between different companies. The insights from our study are relevant for those interested in the diffusion of sustainable product innovation and in incumbent behaviour in sustainability transitions.