Abstract not found

In the competitive market, virtual teams represent a growing response to the need for fasting time-to-market, low-cost and rapid solutions to complex organizational problems. Virtual teams enable organizations to pool the talents and expertise of employees and non-employees by eliminating time and space barriers. Nowadays, companies are heavily investing in virtual team to enhance their performance and competitiveness. Despite virtual teams growing prevalence, relatively little is known about this new form of team. Hence the study offers an extensive literature review with definitions of virtual teams and a structured analysis of the present body of knowledge of virtual teams. First, we distinguish virtual teams from conventional teams, different types of virtual teams to identify where current knowledge applies. Second, we distinguish what is needed for effective virtual team considering the people, process and technology point of view and underlying characteristics of virtual teams and challenges they entail. Finally, we have identified and extended 12 key factors that need to be considered, and describes a methodology focused on supporting virtual team working, with a new approach that has not been specifically addressed in the existing literature and some guide line for future research extracted.

Innovation plays a central role in economic development, at regional and national level. In the competitive environment companies are obliged to produce more rapidly, more effectively and more efficiently in new product development which is a result of research and development (R&D) activities. It is necessary for them to put together different capabilities and services with the goal, through cooperation between suppliers and customers, service providers and scientific institutions to achieve innovations of high quality. Depending on the type of industry, the type of business, the type of innovation and the strategic objectives that have been set, firms will regularly have to modify the way in which their R&D and innovation is organized. Nowadays shift from serial to simultaneous and parallel working in innovation has become more commonplace. Literatures have shown that collaboration is as a meta-capability for innovation. By a comprehensive reviewing of literature this article after define a virtual teams and its characteristics, addressing virtual environments innovation and the relationship to R&D activities. Finally conclude that innovation cannot be successful unless the knowledge and information in the R&D project are effectively captured, shared and internalized by the R&D project’s virtual team members.

Abstract-This paper explores potential advantages and barriers of virtual teams toward making an interrelation between small and medium-sized firms (SMEs) with a comprehensive review on different aspects of virtual teams in SMEs based on authentic and reputed publications. The purpose of the state-of-the-art literature review is to provide an overview of what is known about the structure and dynamics of virtual collaboration in SMEs which they are the back bone of the world business. This study seeks to address some of the advantages of virtual R&D team in the existing extensive literature on the increase SMEs interrelations. Besides of identify benefits of virtual R&D team in SMEs, propose the way of further studies and recommend improvements. We argue that the routines used to promote interrelation between SMEs, based on virtual collaboration can sometimes create problems for firms as they ignore new challenges. We elaborate various theories on the virtual R&D team by reviewing the precedent papers.

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Abstract: National and global collaboration in research and development (R&D) is becoming increasingly important in creating the knowledge that makes research and business more competitive. Multinational enterprises have increased their research and development (R&D) investment in different countries. These multiple sites encourage the development of more ideas, due to the varied international backgrounds in global networks and the knowledge spillovers. In order to secure the viability of business processes, services and products R&D teams need to access and retrieve information from as many sources as possible. From the other perspective virtual teams are important mechanisms for organizations seeking to control scarce resources across geographic and other boundaries. Moreover, virtual collaboration has become vital for most organizations. This is particularly true in the context of designing new product and innovative services. In this paper all the major aspects of Virtual R&D team are discussed in technical terms. The paper provides an integral definition and characterization of virtual R&D team. The potential value that is created by virtual R&D teams for new product development is explored. Lastly, pertinent practical guidelines and implications are presented. Keywords: Virtual R&D team, NPD, Technology management 1.

Innovation is becoming the most important key issue for company’s success in the 21st century. In the competitive environment is necessary for the enterprises to put together different capabilities and services with the goal. It’s a widely accepted that innovation is better achieved by working in team. The employed web services technology, although very popular nowadays but it is still not mature enough, so dealing with it can bring new findings. Virtual teams base on information technology are formed to facilitate transnational innovation processes and it should be noted that innovation has a positive impact on corporate performance. Information and communication technology has brought about significant changes in organizations and produced important benefits, including in the areas of innovation which is recognized as a prime source of national competitive advantage. This contribution proposes a conceptual model for understanding and analyzing the process of virtual R&D team as an innovation and technology assimilation facilitator. The context of the knowledge-based economy introduces a major shift from serial to simultaneous R&D in the way of idea conception to technology creation is conceived. This paper briefly reviews the existing perspectives on virtual teams and their effect on innovation and technology. It also discusses the main characteristics of virtual teams and clarifies the differences aspects of virtual team application in the topic. To support the theoretical analysis, this paper provides a comprehensive review based on authentic and reputed publications. We argue that scanty research has been conducted to facilitate understanding the problem of systematically governing creative innovation toward a technology through virtual R&D teams.

In highly globalized industries such as the automotive industry, product development is strongly dependent on e-collaboration tools that hold the potential to capitalize on specialized-knowledge across nations, organizations and professions. This paper focuses on the determinants and impacts of ecollaboration tools in geographically distributed product development teams. Preliminary results from an empirical study conducted among members of three new product development teams suggest that the determinants of the level of use of e-collaboration tools seem strongly biased towards human-related factors (language differences, training, professional background differences) and that the overall impact of these tools is positive but not significantly related to cost reductions.

Knowledge transfer has been proclaimed as one of the most critical knowledge management activities in the current information age where organizations have to continually learn and continually innovate to remain competitive. Research in the area of knowledge transfer has been conducted in many settings and for various objectives. However, limited attention has been directed towards examining the role of knowledge transfer in information systems development projects (ISD). In this study we empirically examine the impact of source context, knowledge context, and relation context on the process of knowledge transfer among ISD face-to-face team members. Specifically, we test the impact of ISD team member’s capability, credibility, and extent of communication on the process of knowledge transfer. Our findings suggest that in face-to-face ISD teams, an individual is perceived to transfer a significant amount of knowledge to his/her team members if an individual extensively interacts with other team members and is perceived as reasonably credible. Interestingly, an individual’s task related capability did not affect knowledge transfer.

Abstract – In today’s dynamic marketplace, companies are under strong pressure to introduce new products for long-term survival with their competitors. Besides, every company cannot cope up progressively or immediately with the market requirements due to knowledge dynamics being experienced in competitive milieu. Increased competition and reduced product life cycles put force upon companies to develop new products faster. In response to this pressing need there should be some new approach compatible in flexible circumstances. This paper presents a solution based on the Stage-Gate system, which is closely linked with virtual team approach. Virtual teams can provide a platform to advance the knowledge-base in a company and thus to reduce time-to-market. This article introduces conceptual product development architecture under a virtual-team umbrella. The paper describes all the major aspects of new product development (NPD), NPD process and its relationship with virtual team, Stage-Gate system and finally presents a modified Stage-Gate system. It also provides the guidelines for the successful implementation of virtual team in new products development.