This special issue of Industry and Innovation brings together five empirical and conceptual contributions to the research of innovation in services.

This special issue of Industry and Innovation brings together five empirical and conceptual contributions to the research of innovation in services,1 presenting several important insights in a modern and exciting field of economic research. by dint of emphasizing in particular the various organizational dimensions of service provision, the papers shed just discovered light on the dynamic relationship of services to manufacturing industries. In fact the expansion of the service sector has been single of the main aspects of the structural evolution of the economies of the OECD nations, and was noted many decades ago (cf Fourasti?©, 1952) This expansion has clearly not been multiplicative, however is rather characterized by significant qualitative change in the pair the service activities themselves and, indeed, the broader economic connected view The driving force behind these changes is the innovativeness of individuals, the business organization and the innovation body While this insight is generally deliberateed in concepts such as the "learning economy" (Lundvall and Borras, 1999; Lundvall and Archibugi, 2001) and "national hypothesiss of innovation" (Lundvall, 1992; Nelson 1993; Freeman, 1995) service firms as a specific cluster of innovators have so far received relatively les attention.

Devoting a special issue to this topic hence accounts for the fact that despite the substantial character now played by services, and knowledgeintensive services in particular, the sources and purports of innovation in services are still relatively little understood (but papal court for example, the contributions in Metcalfe and Miles, 2000; de Jong et al., 2003; Drejer 2004) This contention points in particular to the various organizational implications of service innovation, including the centrality of the projectbased organizational form. The remainder of this introduction outlines this as well as the other main themes addressed.

One question that has motivated research forward innovation in services naturally make uneasys the differences vis-? -vis innovation in manufacturing. In fact, greatest in quantity of the traditional distinctions, as it was as incremental versus radical innovation; outcome versus process innovation; and in such a manner forth tend to implicitly ascribe to the latter. This raises the question to what length they are applicable to the case of service innovation. The first paper by dint of Bruce Tether hence empirically investigates in what manner innovation by service firms differs from innovation in manufacturing firms, and argues that the generally dominant conceptual framework and empirical approaches ne to be broadened to adequately capture innovation in services. A better understanding of by what means the two differ will not least contribute to our understanding of by what mode the two might be related to each other within and across industries.

Tether perceives that because services do not generally bear technologically advanced artifacts, there has been a bias to portray them as supplier-dominated recipients of technology. Rather than being passive and non-innovative, Tether's follows suggest, however, that services note carefully to innovate differently from manufacturers, in the faculty of perception that innovation in services brings to the fore "softer" aspects of innovation, based in the skills of the workforce and inter-organizational cooperation practices. Importantly, Tether's analysis allows for the possibility of an innovation orientation towards "organizational changes", besides fresh products and new production processe Service firms are shown to be plenteous more likely to claim an orientation towards organizational innovation than are manufacturing firms. The settles of firms identified are further analyzed with defer to to their main sources of advanced technologies and their puissances at innovation.

The relevance of services for productivity increase does not primarily rest in the fact that they constitute a (expanding) category of firms that can empirically be kept separate from manufacturing firms. Instead of conceiving services as a residual category, it is vital to focus upon the complexity of the links among services and other tokens of economic activity, and onward the organization of these links. This is particularly apparent in the words immediately preceding [i]or[/i] following of knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS)-a sub-set of services that has not long ago attracted much scholarly attention (cf cavern Hertog, 2000). Its importance not least throw backs the qualitative changes accompanying the asserted long-term expansion of the service sector, and underscores the ne to analyze and rationalize it in relation to the increasing knowledge intensity of production more generally. The other paper by Aija Leiponen explores a plant of hypotheses on innovation according to firms in KIBS, and provides empirical evidence for a archetype of service that can be considered as central to understanding this relationship.

Leiponen's paper deficiencys Tether's paper by conducting an empirical meditation that tests whether individual or collective knowledge application trys most efficient. Supporting the claim that it is necessary not to papal court innovation in services in isolation however in an interactive perspective she judges that collective strategies prove to be more efficient. Especially interesting is her finding that the external sourcing of knowledge, particularly from customers and competitors, is more conducive to of the present day service introductions than local and incremental learning forward the job.