The study looks to analyze the adoption of strategies for sustainable business and the performance of Brazilian industrial companies. The quantitative character research has involved the execution of a survey. The results have permitted to conclude that the Brazilian companies are enlarging their participation in the international market. However, one must observe that some factors still limit this performance in terms of innovation management and socio-environmental management. Concerning the technological innovation management, one observes that, in spite of the growth of use of external sources of innovation over the last few years, one must still go a long way in the sense of developing a corporate culture that may value the partnership and the collaboration between the companies. Concerning socio-environmental management, the research data confirm the studies by authors mentioned in the literature review who maintain that most Brazilian companies still adopt a reactive stance in relation to these issues.

O estudo propõe-se a compreender o processo de gestão de fontes externas de informação tecnológica, focalizando as práticas adotadas pelas empresas, visando construir um referencial teórico-prático para o desenvolvimento de um processo de inovação tecnológica sustentável. A gestão de fontes de informação não ajuda somente a organização a combinar as fontes de informação internas e externas a serem consideradas, mas também a ampliar as suas atividades de inovação. As empresas estão incrementando as alianças para o uso de fontes externas de informação para inovação, porém ainda carecem de uma estratégia explícita de gestão. A pesquisa survey foi realizada em empresas industriais brasileiras com características inovadoras visando contribuir para as inferências sobre a relação da gestão de fontes externas de informação tecnológica e o desempenho inovador das empresas. A hipótese formulada buscou verificar a existência de associação entre a gestão de fontes externas de informação tecnológica e o desempenho inovador. Para a comprovação da hipótese, foram realizadas análises bivariadas e univariadas por meio da utilização das técnicas estatísticas de análise fatorial, correlação de Spearman e regressão logística. As análises bivariadas e multivariadas das variáveis independentes e dependentes sugerem a existência de associação entre a gestão de fontes externas de informação tecnológica e o desempenho inovador destacando-se a influência do tipo de fonte de informação nos indicadores relativos à inovação em produtos e do tipo de modalidade de acesso à tecnologia nos indicadores relacionados à inovação em processos.

The aim of this study is to understand the different processes for managing outside sources of technology information with a major focus on practices that companies actually adopt. The specific goal of the study is to construct a theoretical and practical frame of reference for developing processes of sustainable technological innovation. Managing sources of information not only helps an organization harmonize the potential inside and outside sources of information but also helps organizations broaden their activities geared to stimulating and bringing about innovation. Companies today are setting up more and more alliances in order to make use of outside sources of information for innovation, but they still lack explicit management strategies. A survey was carried out in Brazilian industrial companies with innovative characteristics, and the aim was to provide new inferences on the relationships between the management of outside sources of technology information and the innovative performance of the companies studied. The objective of the research presented in this paper is to study the relationship between practices for managing external sources of information and the innovative performance of the enterprise. The research can be characterized as quantitative. The data were collected through questionnaires from enterprises seen as having substancial technological innovation activities. The bivariate and multivariate independent and dependent variables suggest the existence of an association between the management of outside sources of technology information and innovative performance. Especially important here is how the different types of sources of information influence the indicators related to products innovation and how the type of access to technology affects the indicators related to processes innovation. The findings of the study suggest many significant relationships between the innovation performance of the enterprise and the types of sources of technological information used and the access modalities to their external sources of technolgical information. The results indicate a trend towards increased use of external sources of information.

The study presents the result of a research that had the objective of evaluate the influence of the size of the company in the practices of management of external sources of technological information and the correspondent impacts of these practices in the innovation performance of the enterprise. The survey was carried based on data collected from a set of Brazilian industrial companies that are considered innovative The analysis of the relation between the management of external sources of technological information and the performance, according to the size of the companies disclosed that although being limited to a smal number there are some significant differences in aspects related to the access to technology and the types of external sources of technological information used by the firms. Some significant differences between small and larger firms on how these managerial practices affect the innovative performance were also detected.