Technology Analysis & Strategic Management

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How and where the R&D takes place in creative

industries? Digital investment strategies of the
book publishing sector

P.-J. Benghozi & E. Salvador

To cite this article: P.-J. Benghozi & E. Salvador (2016) How and where the R&D takes place
in creative industries? Digital investment strategies of the book publishing sector, Technology
Analysis & Strategic Management, 28:5, 568-582, DOI: 10.1080/09537325.2015.1122184

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TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT, 2016
VOL. 28, NO. 5, 568–582
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How and where the R&D takes place in creative industries? Digital
investment strategies of the book publishing sector*
P.-J. Benghozia and E. Salvadora,b
a
Management Research Center, I3-CRG, Ecole Polytechnique, CNRS, Université Paris-Saclay, Bt Ensta 828, Boulevard
des Maréchaux 91762 Palaiseau Cedex, France; bIéseg School of Management, Paris campus, Socle de la Grande
Arche - 1 Parvis de la Défense, F - 92044 Paris La Défense cedex

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

The innovative and strategic models of creative industries (CIs) in the Received 8 January 2014
digital economy are capturing an increasing interest in recent years. Yet, Revised 5 October 2015
most of the literature deals with creation and talent and very little with Accepted 12 November 2015
technological and innovation perspectives. Innovation is in general
KEYWORDS
considered from a single viewpoint: a means to develop new creative Creative industries;
contents. This article investigates an important issue that has been publishing industries; R&D;
surprisingly neglected in scientific literature and public reports: the topic value chain; e-book
of R&D and technological innovations in CIs. The article characterises
how and where R&D takes place in the book publishing industry. A
systematic identification of R&D developments concerning e-book
technology has been achieved using an original methodology set up to
feature the technological strategic evolutions. The results provide a
reliable cartography of the value chain through an adaptation of the
open systems interconnection layers model. This framework helps to
understand the new digital ecosystem of the book publishing sector and
the strategies carried out by the editorial houses.

1. Introduction
Creative industries (CIs) trigger an increasing interest in recent years (UNCTAD 2010). Starting from
the initiatives taking place in the UK (DCMS 1998), many studies investigated their unique contri-
bution to economic growth and organisational design. The literature originally focused on the role
of the creative class and the management of talents (Caves 2000; Florida 2002; Scott 2006). The inter-
est is nowadays focused on networks, CI clusters and creative cities (Crossick 2006; Lazzeretti 2013;
UNCTAD 2010), which are seen as regional development strategies. Lastly, research focused specifi-
cally on the innovative dimensions of CIs and their business models (Benghozi and Lyubareva 2014;
Benghozi and Paris 2007; Howkins 2001; Parkman, Holloway, and Sebastiao 2012; Throsby 2001).
Lazzeretti, Capone, and Innocenti (2015) even developed a systematic bibliometric analysis of the
flows of knowledge, interactions and theoretical origins, demonstrating how the creative economy
research is really a multidisciplinary paradigm born from four knowledge pillars: creative class, crea-
tive city, cultural and CIs, creative clusters. According to these authors, this strand of research contrib-
uted to the rise of the creative sector as a new research field.
The Internet diffusion fostered the development of a knowledge and innovative economy that
assigns all its importance to ‘creative’ processes and information systems (Cohendet and Simon 2007).

CONTACT E. Salvador [email protected]; [email protected]

*
Preliminary versions have been presented at the XII International Conference on Arts&Cultural Management (AIMAC), 26–29 June
2013, Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá (Colombia), at the XI International Conference TripleHelix, 8–10 July 2013, Birkbeck and
UCL, London and at the XXIV International Conference on Strategic Management (AIMS), 3–5 June 2015, Dauphine University, Paris.
© 2015 Taylor & Francis
 TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 569

In this evolution, the CIs are a pioneer and turn to be an ever-increasing inspiration for traditional indus-
tries (Lampel, Lant, and Shamsie 2000): the economic model and the particular organisation of the
sectors, the intangible and cognitive creative components, the growing importance in the digital
market, the new business models and value chain structuring are just some representative aspects.
As a consequence, scientific literature,1 special issues of academic journals2 as well as public
reports3 are increasing.
Their contents are usually very wide-ranging. R&D and technological innovations are neglected
words and essentially considered as a means to develop new creative contents: talents and employ-
ment implications for innovation processes, CI businesses’ innovation contribution and open Inno-
vation in CIs. Despite numerous editorial initiatives (see Note 2), scarce specific investigations
focused on addressing the specific question of ‘technological innovation in CIs’ with few exceptions.4
The very recent special section of Technological Forecasting & Social Change highlighted that Infor-
mation and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are a pivotal driving force for CIs (Sung 2015); it also
focused on how to promote and finance technological innovation, underlining that policies aiming at
promoting innovation in CIs are linked to positive and negative implications (Bae and Yoo 2015).
Nonetheless, notwithstanding this recent attention to innovation aspects, the very important issue
of R&D in CIs (Brandellero and Kloosterman 2010; Green, Miles, and Rutter 2007), continues to be neg-
lected. This is surprising because R&D is unanimously regarded as the main source of growth and
performance in competitive and highly changing environments (cf. Aghion, David, and Foray
2009; Freeman 1974; Lundvall 1992). As highlighted by Barge-Gil, Nieto, and Santamaria (2011),
firms can survive only if they continuously ‘upgrade their technologies’, especially in the digital
age. The few existing studies underline the ‘impact’ of technology – especially the digital one – on
CI sectors and its ‘appropriation’ by the companies. Nonetheless, beyond the appropriation phase,
‘how’ CI actors take part in ‘elaborating and developing’ technological innovations has not yet
been investigated. The development phase is particularly important since it shapes, designs and deter-
mines the structure of further uses. Moreover, it calls for specific skills and knowledge development
whereas several hypotheses exist about the supposed lack of competences of CI actors in order to
invest in intensive technologies.
We assume that the general absence of investigations on R&D activities in CIs in general is due to a
‘biased’ vision of the real relevance of these assets for creative companies. What does the concept ‘R&D’
really mean for creative firms? Actually, innovations can occur in firms that do not perform formal R&D
or they are not counted as the result of formal R&D (Barge-Gil, Nieto, and Santamaria 2011; Nelson
2000). This is even true in the specific case of CIs because, as a matter of fact, creative firms conceive
new products as the development of innovative contents and never consider them as the output of
technological R&D activities.5 When R&D activities are carried out by creative companies (e.g. through-
out project development) they are hardly defined formally as effective R&D activities. This has been
confirmed by Potts (2009, 141) who stated that ‘activity which might otherwise be classified as R&D
is not so classified in these industries’ because it is seen as a normal aspect of business strategic oper-
ations. As a consequence, CIs are generally associated with various forms of ‘hidden innovation’,6 dif-
ficult to measure with traditional indicators (Barge-Gil, Nieto, and Santamaria 2011; Brandellero and
Kloosterman 2010; Cunningham 2013; Green, Miles, and Rutter 2007; Miles and Green 2008).
Within this context, our research perspective aims at understanding where R&D actually takes
place in CIs, how the articulation is made with content and development projects, which economic
actors are taking charge of it, where they are located in the value chain, and how they are articulated
with content producers. In short, to what extent observable innovations reveal the technological
strategies of the actors involved in the book sector.
The actual role of technology and R&D in CIs can be drawn through identifying at which steps
technical innovations take place by depicting and mapping all the main phases of the R&D value
chain in a specific sector. This is the objective of the article. It focuses on the book publishing
sector. On the one hand, it is a well-established and stable industry, based on sunk costs related
to heavy investments in technological infrastructure. On the other hand, the editorial projects
570 P.-J. BENGHOZI AND E. SALVADOR

required only low technical investments and barriers to entry. The digital technologies and e-book
revolution transfigured such market structure.7 The actual context of its technological innovations
value chain is poorly known. Nonetheless, newcomers like Apple, Amazon and Google with their dis-
ruptive innovations are destabilising more and more the book publishing industry. This novelty calls
for and justifies deep research investigations in order to understand if investment strategies in
hidden innovation are identifiable and deserve to be understood. This means to investigate how
content producers can support autonomous strategies in order to face outside technological disrup-
tions. These are the key questions of this article.
In recent years, the book publishing industry has experienced many ICT-based innovations such as
online distant sales and the emergence of e-books (Benhamou 2015; Greco 2011; Guiry et al. 2012;
Howard 2009; Mangematin, Sapsed, and Schubler 2014; Ronte 2001). The corresponding strategy
of publishers is to appropriate the emerging technologies and innovations rather than to define
upstream a controllable ecosystem and technological architecture. Notwithstanding this, the digitis-
ation of book publishing has not been deeply analysed till now. As a matter of fact, the digital trans-
formation process of a traditional publishing house has still been scarcely investigated (Oiestad and
Bugge 2014).
Hence, the objective of this article is to reconstruct the ongoing innovation paths and to charac-
terise the technological R&D ecosystem of this creative sector. It aims to understand in which extent
the book publishing CI can implement pivotal strategies to support endogenous technological inno-
vativeness or should develop early external industrial partnerships. To this aim, an original method-
ology is adopted, meaning the reconstruction of the different phases of the industrial technological
value chain through an adaptation of the classical computer science open systems interconnection
(OSI) model (Zimmermann 1980).
The article is structured as follows. The theoretical framework presents the literature perspective
on R&D. The empirical background then focuses on the various value chain levels and their recent
evolution. After the description of the methodological framework and its theoretical roots, we
present the results of the cartography of the layers in the e-book publishing value chain. Additional
insights from face-to-face interviews will complement this description followed by critical discussion
of the findings and concluding remarks.

2. Theoretical framework
Over the years, the concept of innovation has profoundly changed in economics and strategic man-
agement. It has usually been conceived as the result of an essentially technological process, originat-
ing in basic research and then declining in applied research, development and commercial novelty
(cf. Abernathy and Utterback 1978; Thompson 1967). It calls to mind what Freeman (1974) defined a
‘coupling process’ between the market and the technology sectors. Subsequent studies have shown
that innovation is also a continuous and cross-cutting approach (Brown and Eisenhardt 1998; Nonaka
and Takeuchi 1995). As a consequence, it has then been considered as the ability to rethink the
overall design of a product/service including its dimension, use, service or business model (cf. Von
Hippel 2007). The digital economy has complicated the context by giving to various radical technol-
ogies (e.g. networks, Internet, devices, Appstores) a decisive weight in innovation ecosystems (cf. Yoo
et al. 2012). It had a disruptive effect on existing industries and prevailing business models (Benghozi
and Lyubareva 2014; Oiestad and Bugge 2014).
Thanks to the relevance and nature of R&D (Brockhoff 2003; Narula 2001), innovation and technol-
ogy in firms’ organisation stimulated therefore a large range of literature: among many others,
Aghion, David, and Foray (2009), Christensen (1997), Jacobides and Winter (2007), Lundvall (1992)
and Steinmueller (2010). In the specific context of CIs, the first interesting issue is the general lack
of significant investments in R&D of creative companies. One of the reasons explaining these poor
investments in R&D may be linked to the general small size, skills and capitalisation of CIs (Bhatiasevi
and Dutot, 2014) with related difficulties in R&D investments. Notwithstanding this, other motivations
 TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 571

may explain this deficiency, because also large creative companies are under-investing in R&D (Foun-
dation for RST 2003).
The lack of technical innovation can also be interpreted as a lack of investments in technological
knowledge-based resources. Actually, ‘information technologies play an important role in effectuat-
ing the knowledge-based view of the firm’ and achieving competitive advantage (Alavi and Leidner
2001, 108).
Another line of reasoning argues that it is difficult to separate the investments in projects from the
ones in technologies. Creative firms perceive R&D as something related more to investments in pro-
jects and contents rather than directly to technologies, design and innovation on processes, infra-
structure and devices. Accordingly, another argument has to be raised: CI companies are
considering that they have taken already so much commercial and aesthetic risks by creating new
content that they cannot take in charge additional technical risks. As a consequence, they are reluc-
tant to invest directly in R&D projects and prefer to adopt experienced technical solutions. This
process may originate an involuntary dependence on external innovations (Oiestad and Bugge
2014) that determine the real sector evolution.
Far from being simply considered in technical terms, it means, in terms of sociology of innovation
(Akrich, Callon, and Latour 2002) and of interactionism (Becker 1982), understanding the develop-
ment of innovation as the ability to structure and design a network of actors and stakeholders coop-
erating together on new projects.
In such a perspective, innovation is seen as a normal aspect of business operations and strategy
(Potts 2009). Besides, Jisun (2010) underlined the singularity of innovation patterns in CIs mostly
reliant on non-technological ‘soft’ innovation8 (Stoneman 2010).
Notwithstanding these important issues, the existing literature does not provide insights on the
various phases of the value chain or how R&D is effectively carried out in CIs. This is even the case
for the rare existing studies (e.g. Cunningham et al. 2004; Foundation for RST 2003). Few practical
and implementable solutions emerge, including in the EU9 or extra EU latest studies.10 This situation
is exactly reflected in the book publishing sector: it aroused the attention of both the scientific litera-
ture and the public reports with similar perspectives focusing on economic evolution rather than
technological strategy.
The analysis of the CI value chain is one of the reliable means to analyse the structure and function
of CIs (Bhatiasevi and Dutot, 2014): yet it most often comes down to the basic categorisation into cre-
ation, production, distribution, retail and consumption (UNCTAD 2010). No specific investigations
really aimed at mapping the technology developments and the R&D role in the specific phases of
the value chain of a single CI.

3. Methodology
Our research is supported by a multidimensional and special methodology, specifically designed and
contrived by the authors to extensively characterise and trace the various innovations and techno-
logical paths. First of all, the extensive mapping of the R&D ecosystem of the book publishing industry
has been elaborated through a methodical codification of the technological developments that are
detectable in the recent history of the industry. To that end, we tracked all the existing technical
documents and implemented a systematic exploration of the related content. We carried out a codi-
fication process that aimed at identifying the categories of innovation being developed and their
specific nature, and at setting the R&D development value chain as well as the economic actors sup-
porting it (internal or external to the traditional boundaries of the sector).
We built the cartography starting from an analytical coding of the main characteristics of the e-
readers and tablets: we stripped the technical documentation concerned with technological trajec-
tories and public reports about technologies and we explored the different versions of the most suc-
cessful devices (Kindle, Kobo and Nook, cf. Miller 2013) cross-checked with Internet websites of the
companies.
572 P.-J. BENGHOZI AND E. SALVADOR

Table 1. Sources for data collection: materials and documents.

Material and
documents Types Content (main keywords)
43 Scientific and technical papers Innovation in CIs; digital publishing; book evolution; electronic book;
technology in publishing; R&D; digital media transformation
5 UE reports Publishing sector; e-books; the EU economy of culture; creative economy;
promoting the potential of CIs
2 French reports Business models of CIs; advertising in cultural industries; CIs in EU
reports; management of intangible assets in CIs
9 Other countries (not French) UK CIs; CIs R&D in New Zealand; CIs R&D in Australia; soft innovation
reports and working papers
22 Specialised books The economy of CIs; the Internet economy; entrepreneurship and CIs;
history of book technologies; CIs and innovation; the book publishing
industry; economics of (open) innovation and technology policy
20 Face-to-face interviews French editorial houses, e-book, business model, value chain,
technological investment strategies, digital innovations

Second, face-to-face interviews with CEOs and managers of French publishing houses, founders of
digital platforms and experts in publishing technologies have complemented the mapping perspec-
tive by identifying precise strategies. Table 1 resumes our modus operandi.
The innovative events have been spotted and coded on the basis of: technical identification, date,
related economic actors, corresponding technical layer, value chain level, industrial partnerships and
associated standards. These events have been then represented graphically according to an original
layout (cf. Section 4) structured in successive technical layers. It displays generic technologies,
relationship graphs and the actors embedded in the various phases.11
This technological history has been completed by 20 interviews conducted in Paris between
January and December 2013, according to a sample selected from the most important French pro-
fessional directory (Table 2). The objective was to confirm the key findings of the cartography in pro-
gress, to identify possible missing innovations and to capture the main editorial strategies facing the
e-book revolution and the competing actors.
The results of the analysis have been resumed and visualised in a chart structured according to mul-
tiple technological levels. Every chart corresponds to a particular technical level and presents three
different constituents: (1) the events and/or the actors involved (in bold), (2) the generic technologies
(in italics), and (3) the relationship graphs resuming the various interactions (application, implemen-
tation or reciprocal relations). We adapted the robust and classical seven structural and technical
layers OSI reference model, which is traditionally used in computer sciences and Internet economy
(Zimmermann, 1980). This model portrays the architecture of the industry assuming a hierarchical ver-
tical division of the technical layers. Each consistent layer is considered to be ruled by technological
specificities characterising technological concerns, investments, skills, industrial companies, economic
models and clients’ perspective. It was not possible to use the original version of the OSI model in its
original structure, because it was designed specifically for information technology and telecommuni-
cations. Indeed, it overstates certain components of technical layers that were irrelevant for our pur-
poses. Consequently, we slightly adapted the layers originally designed in the telecommunication
field, in order to fit with the actual structure of a content industry like the book publishing sector. In
particular, the first three layers have been redefined through a separation of the device and the infra-
structure parts. Additionally, we opted to present levels 2 and 3 jointly for layout matters.

Table 2. Sources for data collection: interviews.

Interviews Characteristic of interviewee
7 French publishers
4 Technology professionals
4 Representative actors (i.e. syndicate, associations)
5 Distributors, diffusors, digital libraries
 TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 573

Legend:
1) Events and/or actors involved: bold character
2) Generic technologies: italics
3) Arrows: boxes describing the kind of
relationship
(application, development, reciprocal relation)

4. Results: the cartography of the e-book publishing value chain: focus on the layers
and the interview results
In the OSI model, Level 1 focuses on the operating systems standards. One of the corresponding start-
ing points in the book publishing sector has been the introduction of e-ink technology and electronic
paper displays (EPD) at the end of the 1990s. These technologies are related to Levels 2 and 3 that are
focused on the hardware and technology of terminals: e-ink technology influenced digital printing and
the innovative display supporting the emergence of the first tablets, e-book readers and personal
digital assistants (PDAs). Several formats succeeded one after the other until the prominence at
the international level of e-pub and pdf formats. Recent improvements are identifiable in the
attempt at creating augmented books with additional properties like optical reader-embedded
pen and audio-books. Level 4 is focused on standards and software: blogs and social networks like
Facebook and Twitter, and the diffusion of publishers’ platforms, consortia and partnerships that
are impacting the infrastructures and networks linked to the connection to consumers (Architecture
of infrastructures and networks, Level 5). Printing on demand (POD), digital aggregators, digital
libraries, distribution platforms, are some key examples. In this context, Level 6 (Middleware) is
focused on the tools structuring economic relations and exploitation rights. In particular, it includes
those against piracy like digital rights management (DRM). Finally, Level 7, dedicated to user inter-
faces, identifies the main ongoing developments like 3D e-books and green IT (environmental con-
sequences of toxic substances for e-readers production).
The various OSI levels are presented in details as follows.
Looking at the elements structuring the operational system of e-books, it is interesting to under-
score that the initial technology supporting the e-book development was the electronic ink (e-ink)
rather than the terminal itself or its processor. This electrophoretic-driven technology is a direct
extension of the paper model, ensuring a comfortable reading, including in sunlight, but also redu-
cing energy issues or weight (Leal 2009) (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Level 1: Operating systems standards: the key role of e-ink and EPD technologies.
574 P.-J. BENGHOZI AND E. SALVADOR

Figure 2. Levels 2 and 3: Terminals and hardware: the competition between tablets, e-readers and PDAs.

One of the significant dimensions of the technology rivalry at Levels 2 and 3 is related to the com-
peting devices used to read e-books (Figure 2).12
From 2006 to 2010 several new e-reader devices entered the market, most of them using the e-ink
technology.13 Other improvements may also be found in sound quality and voice synthesis technol-
ogies for facilitating audio-book creation. We are also assisting the emergence of book-apps provid-
ing enriched information and contents. It is worth underlining that despite their various designs and
services, the different e-book readers share similar core technological characteristics. Nonetheless,
there is still no single e-book publishing standard readable by all the devices of e-readers (Miller
2013). This is a result as well as the consequence of the technological strategies implemented by
physical booksellers and publishers, meaning the establishment of industrial partnerships on yet
developed devices (cf. Kindle and Kobo for Barnes & Noble in the USA and Fnac in France, for
instance).
In Level 4, newcomers – often (large) ICT platforms like Amazon – are setting the scene and rein-
venting the traditional business models (Figure 3). The innovations resulted in a shift of power
towards downstream distribution activities through important process innovations: Amazon uses

Figure 3. Level 4: Standards and software: the intermediary role of blogs, social networks, platforms, consortia and partnerships
among publishers.
 TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 575

Figure 4. Level 5: Infrastructures and networks: the role played by connection to consumers.

Figure 5. Level 6: Middleware: economic structuring and piracy concerns.

data-mining systems to enhance the quality of its suggestions, compile users’ choices and rec-
ommendations to develop advertisement.
Collaborations take place with Facebook and game developers to create fresh new contents and
services.14 Major digital book platforms have been launched and the latest e-readers and tablets are
offering links with the main social networks.
At the online distribution level publishers were most technologically active in endeavouring to
develop their own platform (Lebert 2009). Later, new online bookstores were created for selling
only e-books: the control of these platforms turns out to be a competitive resource in order to
keep the relations with customers, but it also calls for joining together heavy investments and distinc-
tive skills (Figure 4).
Furthermore, connection to consumers benefits from the introduction of POD. From technological
commodities, books became microtechnological innovations, meaning the result of wholesale mech-
anisation of printing (Howard 2009).
Piracy is one of the main problems faced by the digital revolution (De Prato and Simon 2014) and
therefore turns out to be a key issue at Level 6 (Figure 5). Tools like encryption, electronic watermark
and DRM are helping publishers to find a suitable solution (Carreiro 2010).

Figure 6. Level 7: Terminals and users: technical interface and ergonomy.

576 P.-J. BENGHOZI AND E. SALVADOR

The seventh layer is mainly devoted to the structuring of users’ interfaces. An interesting activity in
progress is e-book accessibility to people with print disabilities: features like the translation of the
visual digital text of an e-book into voice-audio mode increases accessibility to persons with disabil-
ities (OECD 2012). Technical competence gaps can still be an obstacle for individuals willing to access
e-books and in particular enhanced e-books with apps and richer features (Figure 6).

5. Critical findings: Discussion

The e-book technological paths portray an undetermined model of development. E-books contribute
to the design of a new digital ecosystem calling for huge and unused investments of publishing
houses in order to support the appropriation of new technical skills, to outline support interoperabil-
ity between various devices and standards, to build specialised software expertise to publish e-books,
and to learn new methods of digital marketing adapted to the new distribution channels. R&D and
innovation are leading this evolutionary process. Our original cartography demonstrates that each
technical layer is supporting specific strategic perspectives. As a consequence, publishers have
even more difficulty in perceiving the evolution of their environment and designing alternative
options.

5.1. Where R&D takes place in the book publishing sector? Some reflections arising from
the cartography and the interview results
The e-ink’s technology (Level 1) revolutionised the e-readers’ world. They became lighter, more
compact and easier to read with increased and/or more displayed screen sizes. They also improved
the battery life and the capacity to hold more and more information with expandable memory (Levels
2 and 3). But, in recent years the e-readers have followed one another and the market is still open: a
reference and standard model of digital reading support does not exist.
In this context, publishers are investing on skill development: the publishers interviewed high-
lighted the role of specific trainings attended by internal staff. Technological competences can be,
alternately, supported by emerging platforms (Level 4), established in the form of a consortium
among several publishers or managed by external actors playing the role of intermediaries: this
was confirmed by the interviews of distributors and diffusors.
Nonetheless, editorial houses are following the market needs without playing an effective role of
leaders. Our interviews confirm that publishers are, for the most part, using the new platforms for
distributing books through the Internet; they are also clients of societies that offer assistance in build-
ing standard formats like e-pub (Levels 2 and 3), they adopt tools like DRM or electronic watermark,
but they are aware of the lack of strong support of tools structuring economic relations and exploita-
tion rights and in particular those against piracy (Level 6). At the end of the day, imitation rather than
emulation process takes place among publishers (DiMaggio and Powell 1983; Hannan and Freeman
1984). One reason is the heterogeneity of techniques and supply of e-readers, tablets and PDAs
(Levels 2 and 3): a French publisher argued that this heterogeneity is a ‘nightmare’ and publishers
do not know which way to go for not losing market power. Indeed, publishers pay attention to be
present everywhere and visible in all technological formats and platforms, as was the case with
the printed book.
Investments in R&D and innovation are thus not linked to the creation of a real business model,
but mostly to visibility, to maintain the secular place and role of publishers rather than to update their
role and functions to the emerging and instable environment. This raises questions about sustainabil-
ity of this fragile temporary system. The incumbents do not seem to grasp and have the willingness to
take the leadership of the actual dynamics of the R&D and innovation evolutionary process. As a
matter of fact, one of the key points resulting from the interviews is linked to technological standards
(Levels 2 and 3): e-pub and pdf formats have not been a ‘choice’, but an ‘imposition’ at the inter-
national level. This is a significant concern for a sector that has grown from low to intensive
 TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 577

technology. In the digital-based sectors, technology shapes the strategies of economic actors and
gives its full importance to standards. They are not depending on publishers but they have estab-
lished themselves internationally, through consortia and dominant firms (cf. EPUB3).
In order to maintain their secular place in the digital market, publishers focus, consequently, on
‘trust’ building in the relationship with distributors (Level 5). The latter are playing a key role for
the visibility of the catalogue on all the main digital bookshops. They also try to be present in the
emerging specialised platforms as well as in the blogs and links with social networks (Level 4).15
The relationship between publishers and Internet advertising for books (Level 5) is another key
confirmation of our assumptions. The interviews highlighted that publishers are aware of the impor-
tance of the Internet in terms of promotion activities and marketing, but they use this tool only for
experimenting marginal initiatives.
On the contrary, a main problem is raised by the emerging role of dominant actors like Amazon
and Fnac (Level 5): the combination of hardware sales and content delivery. While publishers still
argue that suggestions coming from the experience of a physical bookseller cannot be replaced
by the algorithmic prescription, there is also a general concern that publishers are losing control
of their business to giants from outside the industry, like Amazon, Apple and Google (Guiry et al.
2012; Miller 2013).

5.2. The actual publishers’ strategy

The book sector is subject to variable evolution rhythms. The printed book benefited from the stab-
ility of a secular model, while the e-book does not yet have a reference model. From a simple down-
loadable document supported by a shared infrastructure, the e-book moved to a specific
(proprietary) ecosystem. Such technological evolutions are concerning software as well as hardware.
In particular, the evolution of e-readers supported autonomous competing legacy systems combined
with incremental innovations enriching services and reading functions.
Facing the unlimited possibilities of ICT-based innovations, the book publishing industry is charac-
terised by the willingness to retain a position of control regarding the rates of technological change,
as recently highlighted by Oiestad and Bugge (2014).
Consequently, the impact of ICT may be defined as ‘hidden’16: innovation depends more and more
on technologies and standards that are ‘external’ to these industries. Accordingly, the actors in the
CIs’ sectors have to involve themselves into wider existing business ecosystems in order to survive
and grow and to keep their editorial autonomy and economic influence.
Our main result supports the idea that innovation in CIs is hidden but in a quite specific meaning.
While Barge-Gil, Nieto, and Santamaria (2011); Brandellero and Kloosterman (2010); Cunningham
(2013); Miles and Green (2008) or Green, Miles, and Rutter (2007) argue that innovation is hidden
because it is incorporated in creative contents, we add that innovation is hidden, furthermore,
because the technological developments in CIs are, as a matter of fact, concealed and covered. Insi-
ders never consider about investing in R&D in order to develop new technology. They rather think
over adopting and adapting themselves to technological innovations developed elsewhere.
The book publishing sector has always been characterised by incremental innovations arising
from large competing publishers. The e-book introduction represents instead a radical innovation.
It generates consequently the defensive strategy of editorial houses mobilising huge investments
to develop innovations (POD for instance) aiming at refurbishing the traditional printed book
model. While the e-book benefits more newcomers like Amazon, Apple and Google, the printed
book was seen as a key source of differentiation and the only means to control the digital evolution.
In such a situation, the absence of effective competencies and technological expertise turns out to be
a critical point for publishers: Oiestad and Bugge (2014) argued that on the one hand, they are devel-
oping interoperable digital infrastructures, standards and joint distribution systems; on the other
hand, they are waiting for a common dominant design to emerge and are moving slowly towards
the new digital ecosystem.
578 P.-J. BENGHOZI AND E. SALVADOR

These different perspectives confirm our basic assumption that the technological strategies not
only improved performance and productivity, as happens usually in traditional industries, but rede-
fined completely the market designs, the business models, the boundaries and the book industry.
The technological development phase is as important as the appropriation phase most often
emphasised in the literature. CI actors’ implication in technologies may be sustainable through the
insertion in a specific ecosystem or the development of strategic partnerships with manufacturers
of equipment and software through a division of roles.

6. Conclusions
The e-book diffusion fostered publishers to an increased attention towards appropriateness of R&D
and technological innovation. They are focusing on some particular aspects and, therefore, could not
be able to adopt a global reactive strategy against competitors and incomers.
In conclusion, the actual main problem is linked to concealed innovation in the publishing sector:
absence of investments in technological development focused on an ‘effective’ business model. Pub-
lishers are adapting their editorial strategy to the succeeding new digital demand needs and the
emerging new technological devices, but they are not leading this evolving process with a convin-
cing strategy. In this context, the emergence of devices (readers, e-books, i-phone) and the modes
of dematerialised diffusion provide interesting examples of the way the economy of CIs is disrupted
by R&D coming from more technical sectors. The price war and technological rivalry among publish-
ers are led by different mechanisms and economic objectives: increase in revenues and market share
for the former, creation of dominant terminals in order to benefit from networks and to impose a
standard for the latter.
New players emerge and offer unprecedented solutions for aggregating and distributing content,
designing original terms of marketing and transaction adapted to this new framework. Therefore, the
weight of the technology is also the weight of intermediaries (Benghozi, Salvador, and Simon 2015)
and economic actors supporting and supported by these technologies: Google, Amazon and Apple
are representative examples.
The ICT revolution calls therefore for a prompt and effective response at the regulatory level. It
turns out actually necessary to specify the new role of cultural policy makers (Eltham 2009). Facing
the e-book revolution, governments should be fostered to think and develop their action from an
industrial reasoning and not just from a cultural objective or dissemination perspective.

Notes
1. For example, for the qualitative ones: Benhamou (2015), Bhatiasevi and Dutot (2014), Flew and Cunningham (2010),
Harper (2011), Hotho and Champion (2011), Jaw, Chen, and Chen (2012); for the quantitative ones: Bettiol and Sedita
(2011), Bohnenkamp et al. (2015), Chaston, Sadler-Smith (2012), Muller et al. (2009), Parkman, Holloway, and Sebas-
tiao (2012).
2. Compare Industry & Innovation, 2008, special issue: Managing Situated Creativity in Cultural Industries; International
Journal of Cultural Policy, 2009, special issue: After the Creative Industries; Innovation: Management, Policy and Prac-
tice, 2009, special issue: Innovation Policy in the Creative Industries; Organization Studies, 2012, special issue: Misfits,
Mavericks and Mainstreams: Drivers of Innovation in Creative Industries; Technological Forecasting and Social
Change, special section: Digital Technology and the Creative Industries: Disassembly and Reassembly, 2014; Inter-
national Journal of Arts Management, special issue: Financing Creativity: New Issues and New Approaches, 2014;
Technological Forecasting and Social Change, special section: The Creative Economy in Global Competition, 2015.
3. For example, CBI (2014), Davy (2007), Foundation for Research, Science and Technology (2003), HKU (2010), KEA
(2006), Roxane (2014), Santagata (2009), SGS (2013), UNCTAD (2010).
4. Compare, in particular, the Special Issue ‘Innovation Policy in the Creative Industries’ (Innovation: Management,
Policy and Practice, 2009).
5. The famous André Malraux, at that time French ministry of culture, characterized in the 60s the film industry as a
prototype industry, considering esthetical originality as the main source of inventiveness. Nonetheless, the main dis-
ruptive technological innovations in the CIs have always taken place outside these industries. This was the case for
sound movie (invented by General Electric in the early XXth), for the disruptive devices like Walkman or CD (created
 TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 579

by Philips or Sony before they entered into the media industry), and, more recently, for the MP3 and Appstore in
music.
6. The concept of hidden innovation is deepened and contextualized to the book publishing industry in Section 5.2.
7. This makes this sector a more suitable case study compared to other high-tech CIs calling for heavier technological
investments like cinema or video-games.
8. Stoneman (2010, 23–24) focused extensively on innovation in CIs and ‘product aesthetics’: he defined soft inno-
vation as ‘the introduction of any new aesthetic product or product variant [or] aesthetic innovations in industries
the output of which is not aesthetic per se but functional’.
9. Compare Australia (SGS 2013), Canada (Davy 2007); New Zealand (Foundation for RST 2003); the UK (CBI 2014;
Green, Miles, and Rutter 2007); France (PIPAME 2012); Austria (Muller, Rammer, and Trüby 2009); France and
Europe (Roxane 2014).
10. These reports document and value the size and role of the creative economy at national or local level, they evaluate
its pivotal economic contributions through the provision of some statistics on a number of creative sectors, and
assess that creativity is essential to workforce investment and economic development strategies.
11. For instance, the deep analysis of all the main features of the different e-reader versions helped out to identity the
precise technologies that influenced the competitive characteristics of these e-readers. The technologies have been
investigated in details and catalogued in various groupings. These groups revealed, in particular, how several
specific technologies have been introduced for ink and display characteristics development, for light and quality
image improvements, for sound property ameliorations and for features of augmented e-books.
12. A representative list of examples of e-readers and tablets is provided in Appendix.
13. The attention towards e-books and digital reading increased conspicuously when Sony released its e-reader Librié in
2006 in the US market and Amazon launched the Kindle e-reader with its online sales mechanism in 2007, followed
by Barnes and Noble with its Nook e-reader in 2009.
14. The social media interest in the book publishing sector is exemplified by the Facebook’s purchase of book app
developer Push Pop Press and the partnership with Kobo and NetFlix (Guiry et al. 2012).
15. It is interesting to highlight the emergence of a new strategy of building relationships with consumers-readers: the
way of buying books is now personalised and readers are followed after having bought a book through their active
involvement and interactions on the social networks. Digital bookshops, publishing-related community blogs, social
media and social networking sites are emerging as key tools for attracting new clients and fostering the diffusion of
e-books (Carreiro 2010; Tian and Martin 2010).
16. Elaborated by Green, Miles, and Rutter (2007) and by Miles and Green (2008), the concept of hidden innovation (not-
R&D-based innovations) clearly accounts for this perspective. It refers to the fact that a significant group of firms
develops innovations spontaneously and with creativity, without performing formal R&D activities: for example,
Barge-Gil, Nieto, and Santamaria (2011) explored the role played by non-R&D activities that can, anyway, lead to
innovation, meaning technology forecasting, design, use of advanced technologies and training. They found that
non-R&D activities are critical factors in explaining a company’s product and process innovations.

Acknowledgements
This research has been carried out thanks to the financial support of the Centre National du Livre (CNL), Paris.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors
Pierre-Jean Benghozi is Research Director at the National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and Professor at Ecole
polytechnique (Paris, France). He developed, since the early 1980s, a pioneering research group on Information Technol-
ogy, Telecommunications, Media and Culture. Co-Chairman of AIMAC, the largest international Conference for Art and
Culture Management, he is also board member of scientific committees in highest French institutions and numerous
international scientific conferences and academic journals. His competencies made him nominated commissioner and
member of the executive board of the French national regulatory authority for electronic communications and postal
services (ARCEP).
Elisa Salvador holds an international PhD in Institutions, Economics & Law from the University of Turin (Italy). She has
worked for the Italian National Research Council (CNR) on several projects focused on innovation policies. She won the
CNR award ‘Promotion of Research 2005’ for her project ‘The financing of research spin-offs: an analysis of the Italian
case’. She has recently collaborated with the Polytechnic of Turin, with the Chaire Entrepreneuriat as well as with the
Centre d’Etudes et de Recherche Amérique Latine-Europe of the Business School ESCP-Europe. She is currently an
580 P.-J. BENGHOZI AND E. SALVADOR

Associate Researcher at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris and she is Adjunct Professor at Iéseg School of Management,
Economics and International Business Economics tracks.

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Appendix

E-readers/tablets: some representative examples

Rocket eBook of Gemstar (1998) project failed in 2003
Softbook (1998)
Franklin eBookMan (1999)
Cytale Cybook (2001) project failed in 2002
Sony Librié (2004) project failed
Sony Reader Portable Reader System (2006)
iRex iLiad (2006) project failed in 2010
Apple’s iPhone (2006), Apple’s iPad (2010)
Amazon Kindle (2007), Kindle2 (2009), KindleDX (2009), Kindle3 (2010), Kindle4 (2011), Kindle Fire (2011), Kindle Touch (2012),
Kindle Paperwhite (2012), Kindle FireHD (2012), Kindle Paperwhite2 (2013), Kindle FireHDX (2013)
Cybook Gen3 (2007), Cybook Opus (2009), Cybook Orizon (2010), Cybook Odyssey (2011), Cybook Odyssey HD (2012), Cybook
Odyssey edition 2013, Cybook tablet (2013)
Sony PRS-500 (2006), PRS-505 (2007), PRS-700 (2008), PRS-300 Pocket edition (2009), PRS-600 Touch edition (2009), PRS-900 Daily
edition (2009), PRS-350 Pocket edition (2010), PRS-650 Touch edition (2010), PRS-950 Daily edition (2010), PRS-T1 reader Wifi
(2011), PRS-T2 reader Wifi (2012), PRS-T3 (2013)
Barnes&Noble Nook (2009), Nook Wifi and Color (2010), Nook Simple Touch (2011, 2012), Nook HD and HD+ (2012), Nook Glowlight
(2013)
Kobo (2010), Kobo Wifi (2010), Kobo Touch (2011), Kobo Mini, Kobo Glo, Kobo Arc (2012), Kobo Aura and Aura HD (2013), Kobo
Arc7, 7HD and 10HD (2013)
Barnes&Noble Plastic Logic Que eReader (2010)
PDAs: Palm Pilot (1996), Microsoft Pocket PC (2000), Hewlett-Packard, Sony, Handspring, Toshiba, Casio