An Evaluation of the Effect of Technological Innovations on Corporate Performance: A Study of Selected Manufacturing Firms in Nigeria

Abstract

This study appraises the effect of technological innovation on performance of Nigeria manufacturing firms. The purpose of the study is to determine whether there is technological innovation in some performing manufacturing firms in Nigeria and the extent it has contributed to their performances. The population of the study is 8725 being the total staff strength of ten manufacturing firms spread across ten sub sectors of manufacturing sector in Nigeria Stock Exchange while the sample size was extracted from the population using Taro Yameni method.  Structured questionnaire was used to generate the primary data.  The study used descriptive type of survey design while t-statistics was adopted for hypotheses testing. The result of the study revealed that Process innovation has significant positive effect on the  performance of  manufacturing  firms ;that Product Innovation has significant positive effect on the  performance of manufacturing firms; that Organizational structure has significant positive effect on the performance of manufacturing firms; and that employee development  significantly affect  firm's performance positively.  In view of the above findings, the study concludes that even though most firms in the manufacturing sector are not performing, the result from selected few performing manufacturing firms used in this study attest to presence of  technological innovation which  is a critical success factor behind their success. The study therefore recommends that  Nigeria manufacturing firms should give more serious attention to technological innovation, endeavor to lay more emphasis on   employee development as it is an indispensable factor that facilitates technological innovation and that manufacturing firms should adopt appropriate structure because appropriate structure provides a solid foundation for company's operation and technology.