Innovation in Knowledge Intensive Business Services (KIBS) David Doloreux * HEC Montréal Anthony Frigon University of California, Los Angeles Abstract This article examines the determinants of innovation in knowledge intensive business services (KIBS), generally hy- pothesizing that differences in the effect of the determinants of innovation depend on the type of innovation developed within KIBS. The study results are based on estimates of two econometric models using data from a survey of 392 firms in the province of Ontario, Canada. © 2019 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Keywords: technological innovation, non-technological in- novation, knowledge intensive business services, Ontario, Canada Résumé Cet article traite des déterminants de l’innovation dans les services à forte intensité de connaissances (SFIC). L’hypothèse générale de l’article est que des différences seront observées quant à l’effet des déterminants de l’innovation selon les types d’innovation développés au sein des SFIC. Les résultats de l’étude sont fondés sur l’estimation de deux modèles économétriques utilisant des données issues d’une enquête réalisée auprès de 392 entreprises de la province de l’Ontario (Canada). © 2019 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Mots-clés: innovation technologique, innovation non technologique, services à forte intensité de connaissance, Ontario, Canada Introduction Over the past decade, theoretical and empirical work has sought to better understand the nature of innovation in knowledge intensive business services (KIBS). Among this research, some studies have touched on the determinants of service innovation, in particular activities that stimulate in- novation and contribute to its commercialization (Janssen et al., 2018; Rodriguez, Doloreux, & Shearmur, 2017, 2016; Pina & Tether, 2016; Dautel, 2015; Mongo, 2013; Doloreux & Shearmur, 2010; Freel, 2006; Tether, 2005). While these articles tend to focus on one of the determinants of innovation, there has been little consideration of the actual and combined impact of these determinants on the various forms of innovation developed within KIBS. The discussion of innovation in services has only been undertaken recently, having fallen prey to the broader reso- nance of work on manufacturing and analyses and investiga- tions of the manufacturing sector. This article strives to identify the relationships between the main determinants of innovation in KIBS both in technology and in non- technology service firms. We use cross-sectionaldata from a survey of 392 KIBS firms in the province of Ontario, Canada. The use of KIBS as the subject for the study is justified by the importance of KIBS enterprises in the Canadian econ- omy and indeed in most industrialized economies. In Canada, recent studies by Statistics Canada show that, be- tween 2012 and 2016, the category of Professional, scientific and technical services (NAICS 54) has grown annually by 2.3%, the greatest increase among all two-digit NAICS sec- tors (Statistics Canada, 2017). Moreover, firms in this sector tend to implement strategies that allow them to use a wide range of resources and sources of knowledge to support in- novation (Rodriguez et al., 2017). The article is organized as follows: the first section con- tains a review of the literature on innovation in service firms and presents our conceptual framework and research This research was made possible with the financial support of the Social Sci- ences and Humanities Research Council of Canada through Creating Digital Opportunity: Canada’s ICT Industry in Global Perspective project (895- 2013-1008). The authors would like to thank David Wolfe as well as the two anonymous referees for their comments, which helped improve the ar- ticle. The authors would also like to thank Valérie Vézina for helpfully re- reading the article. *Please address all Please address correspondence to: David Doloreux, Département d’affaires internationales, 3000 chemin de la Côte-Sainte- Catherine, Montreal, Quebec, H3T 2A7, Canada. Email: david. doloreux@hec.ca Contract/grant sponsor: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada; contract/grant number: 895-2013-1008. Canadian Journal of Administrative Sciences Revue canadienne des sciences de l’administration (2019) Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/CJAS.1525 Can J Adm Sci (2019) © 2019 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.