Excerpt from Survival in the Network: On the Persistence of Research Organizations in an Emerging Field

H1: The likelihood of persistence in the development of a technology increases when the focal organization belongs to an interconnected clique of collaborating organizations in the community.

It is obvious, though, that the position of a research organization in a collaborative r8£d network is a multidimensional concept. Based on sociometric theory (e.g. Burt, 1992; Freeman, 1977 and 1979; Knoke and Kuklinski, 1983) several indicators of the position of an organization in its collaborative network can be operationalized. The first indicator is the size of the network to which an individual organization belongs. As the number of organizations collaborating with a focal organization increases, its exposure to diverse sources of 'tacit' knowledge increases (cohen and Levinthal, Access to multiple knowledge sources may in turn have a positive effect on the persistence of the organization to continue its efforts in the field.

H2: The number of organizations with which a focal organization directly interacts will have a positive effect on its contribution-span.

Network size alone does not yet capture the intensity of collaboration among directly interconnected organizations. If ego's network consists of N organiza tions, then the maximum number of possible linkages among the N actors is n(n if the network is symmetrical. Burt's proportional density indicator (1991) reflects the number of contact pairs the focal organization is involved in divided by the maximum number of contact dyads the organization could be in volved in, given the size of its network. Proportional density can now be linked to knowledge diversity. The more the proportional density in ego's network ap proaches its maximum value of 1, the more homogenous we assume the knowledge sources represented by the various actors in the network to be. Homogeneity has the advantage of introducing focus in the research agendas by the members of the network, but it has the potential disadvantage of reducing the variety of problem-solving approaches pursued by the network actors. Therefore, as a corollary to hypothesis 2, the influence of network homogeneity on organizational contribution-spans warrants further exploratory attention.

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