The transition towards a biobased economy requires innovations. In addition to the usual challenges of innovation trajectories, the characteristics of biobased innovations cause extra difficulties. To lower the failure rate of innovation trajectories in general, companies tend to form R&D collaborations. Choices made during the formation of such R&D collaborations play a key role in the project's success. Here, one may benefit from the social sciences. This paper presents a perspective on what the social sciences may bring to analyze and improve the formation process of biobased R&D collaborations. The paper also provides an overview of relevant innovation and transition models, and lists the dominant variables in such formation processes (biobased characteristics and general determinants), and the guidelines that seem useful. Although each model has its advantages, none of the innovation and transition models studied addresses both the phases of a formation process of a biobased R&D collaboration and the variables involved in each phase. Concerning the formation process of biobased R&D collaborations, the literature addresses social, organizational, technological, economic, and environmental variables. The key determinants of multi-partner R&D collaborations are partner properties, motives to join a consortium, appropriability of a firm, and project properties. The descriptions of their influence on an R&D collaboration presented here can be used as guidelines, as recommendations, in processes for the formation of relatively less complex R&D collaborations. The influence of biobased characteristics – such as type of innovation (drop-ins versus novel materials), biorefinery, biomass supply and technological challenges – on R&D collaboration have not been studied systematically as yet.

中文翻译：

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如何改进形成生物基研发合作的过程

向生物经济转型需要创新。除了创新轨迹的常见挑战外，生物基创新的特点也带来了额外的困难。为了降低整体创新轨迹的失败率，企业倾向于形成研发合作。在形成此类研发合作期间做出的选择对项目的成功起着关键作用。在这里，人们可能会受益于社会科学。本文提出了社会科学可以带来什么来分析和改进生物基研发合作的形成过程的观点。该论文还概述了相关创新和转型模型，并列出了此类形成过程中的主要变量（生物基特征和一般决定因素），以及似乎有用的指导方针。尽管每种模式都有其优势，但所研究的创新和转型模式均未涉及生物基研发合作形成过程的各个阶段以及每个阶段所涉及的变量。关于生物基研发合作的形成过程，文献涉及社会、组织、技术、经济和环境变量。多合作伙伴研发合作的关键决定因素是合作伙伴属性、加入财团的动机、公司的专有性和项目属性。此处介绍的对它们对研发合作影响的描述可用作指导方针和建议，用于形成相对不太复杂的研发合作的过程。