This paper studiesthe relevance of productheterogeneity and relatedness for the accumulation ofcapabilities in firms, as well as their implications for innovation dynamics. The existing literature has produced extensive evidence on the relevance of capability accumulation for innovation processes. Yet, an assessment of prior attempts to model these processes indicates that when it comes to the final consumption good sector, the evolutionary macroeconomic literature has focused on process rather than product innovation. To facilitate the consideration of empirical and microeconomic insights on product innovation in these models, this paper introduces a simple agent-based model, which may later serve as an innovation module in macroeconomic models. In the model, firms accumulate capabilities to produce final consumption goods that are heterogeneous in terms of their complexity and differ in their relatedness to each other. The model is used to study theoretical implications of different topological structures underlying product relatedness by conducting simulations with different ‘product spaces’. The analysis suggests that the topological structure of the product space, the assumed relationship between product complexity and centrality, as well as the relevance of product complexity in price setting dynamics have significant but nontrivial implications and deserve further attention in evolutionary macroeconomics.

本文研究了产品异质性和相关性与企业能力积累的相关性，以及它们对创新动态的影响。现有文献已经就能力积累与创新过程的相关性提供了广泛的证据。然而，对先前模拟这些过程的尝试的评估表明，当涉及最终消费品部门时，演化宏观经济文献关注的是过程而不是产品创新。为了便于在这些模型中考虑对产品创新的经验和微观经济学见解，本文介绍了一个简单的基于代理的模型，该模型以后可以作为宏观经济模型中的创新模块。在模型中，企业积累了生产最终消费品的能力，这些最终消费品的复杂性不同，彼此之间的相关性也不同。该模型用于通过使用不同的“产品空间”进行模拟来研究产品相关性的不同拓扑结构的理论含义。分析表明，产品空间的拓扑结构、产品复杂性和中心性之间的假设关系以及产品复杂性在价格设定动态中的相关性具有重要但不平凡的含义，值得在演化宏观经济学中进一步关注。该模型用于通过使用不同的“产品空间”进行模拟来研究产品相关性的不同拓扑结构的理论含义。分析表明，产品空间的拓扑结构、产品复杂性和中心性之间的假设关系以及产品复杂性在价格设定动态中的相关性具有重要但不平凡的含义，值得在演化宏观经济学中进一步关注。该模型用于通过使用不同的“产品空间”进行模拟来研究产品相关性的不同拓扑结构的理论含义。分析表明，产品空间的拓扑结构、产品复杂性和中心性之间的假设关系以及产品复杂性在价格设定动态中的相关性具有重要但不平凡的含义，值得在演化宏观经济学中进一步关注。