The outstanding relevance of frugal innovation in the manufacturing sector of emerging economies

In this paper, a systematic literature review was conducted to identify the contributions of frugal innovation in the manufacturing sector of emerging economies. This study aims to understand the contribution of frugal innovation, highlighting the relevance and its contribution to this sector within global emerging markets. To approach this research, three indexed databases of high quality and scientific visibility were considered: Scopus, Ebscohost and Science Direct, with a search equation defined by the keywords: "frugal innovation", "frugal", "emerging economies" and "frugal manufacturing" and the exclusion and inclusion criteria, which allowed to select in a first search 15079 articles. As a final result of the filtering process of those documents identified as repetitive, not relevant to the research topic, 52 documents were obtained, which facilitated the identification of the most outstanding frugal innovations, their classification, description, frugal, social and economic contribution in emerging communities. The selected documents show that the subsector with the greatest contribution of goods and services derived from the application of frugal innovation corresponds to the energy sector, with 37,5%, followed by the industrial sector, with 20%. The research provides a theoretical reference in which the importance of frugality is highlighted, offering a positive perspective for emerging regions facing shortages in access to fundamental services such as electricity, drinking water and essential goods necessary for a dignified life.