IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/tefoso/v82y2014icp140-148.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The inner circle of technology innovation: A case study of two Chinese firms

Author

Listed:
  • Zheng, Connie

Abstract

In the era of information economy, Chinese firms have realised that technology innovation is fundamental for organisations to gain competitive advantages in the global market. This case study evaluates the drivers and antecedents of technology innovation of two emerging Chinese multinational firms. Institutional theory, the resource-based view and the competency-based strategic perspective are used as the basis for case analysis. The findings show some similarities and differences between the growth of Chinese multinational firms and those of more traditional ones. Chinese firms appear not to follow single innovation pathways but take multiple routes combining several types of innovation, such as strategic, organisational and operational innovation. The key component in the successful technology innovation process among Chinese firms was found to be in alignment with several human resource management strategies. The case study concludes with discussion on managerial and pedagogical implications. These help address inherent differences in the innovation management process between emerging Chinese and established multinational firms.

Suggested Citation

  • Zheng, Connie, 2014. "The inner circle of technology innovation: A case study of two Chinese firms," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 140-148.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:tefoso:v:82:y:2014:i:c:p:140-148
    DOI: 10.1016/j.techfore.2013.06.005
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0040162513001315
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.techfore.2013.06.005?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Altenburg, Tilman & Schmitz, Hubert & Stamm, Andreas, 2008. "Breakthrough China's and India's Transition from Production to Innovation," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 325-344, February.
    2. John Mathews, 2006. "Dragon multinationals: New players in 21 st century globalization," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 23(1), pages 5-27, March.
    3. Utterback, James M & Abernathy, William J, 1975. "A dynamic model of process and product innovation," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 3(6), pages 639-656, December.
    4. Kaufman, Bruce E., 2003. "The organization of economic activity: insights from the institutional theory of John R. Commons," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 71-96, September.
    5. Chen, Kun & Kenney, Martin, 2007. "Universities/Research Institutes and Regional Innovation Systems: The Cases of Beijing and Shenzhen," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 35(6), pages 1056-1074, June.
    6. Peter J Buckley & L Jeremy Clegg & Adam R Cross & Xin Liu & Hinrich Voss & Ping Zheng, 2007. "The determinants of Chinese outward foreign direct investment," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 38(4), pages 499-518, July.
    7. Hu, Mei-Chih & Mathews, John A., 2005. "National innovative capacity in East Asia," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(9), pages 1322-1349, November.
    8. Yam, Richard C. M. & Guan, Jian Cheng & Pun, Kit Fai & Tang, Esther P. Y., 2004. "An audit of technological innovation capabilities in chinese firms: some empirical findings in Beijing, China," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(8), pages 1123-1140, October.
    9. Kathleen M. Eisenhardt & Jeffrey A. Martin, 2000. "Dynamic capabilities: what are they?," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(10‐11), pages 1105-1121, October.
    10. Ju Liu & Angathevar Baskaran & Shiming Li, 2009. "Building Technological-Innovation-Based Strategic Capabilities at Firm Level in China: A Dynamic Resource-Based-View Case Study," Industry and Innovation, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(4-5), pages 411-434.
    11. Hu, Mei-Chih & Mathews, John A., 2008. "China's national innovative capacity," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(9), pages 1465-1479, October.
    12. Zhou, Kevin Zheng & Gao, Gerald Yong & Yang, Zhilin & Zhou, Nan, 2005. "Developing strategic orientation in China: antecedents and consequences of market and innovation orientations," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 58(8), pages 1049-1058, August.
    13. Deng, Ping, 2009. "Why do Chinese firms tend to acquire strategic assets in international expansion?," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 44(1), pages 74-84, January.
    14. Kevin Zhou & Caroline Li, 2007. "How does strategic orientation matter in Chinese firms?," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 24(4), pages 447-466, December.
    15. Yadong Luo & Rosalie L Tung, 2007. "International expansion of emerging market enterprises: A springboard perspective," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 38(4), pages 481-498, July.
    16. Pattit, Jason M. & Raj, S.P. & Wilemon, David, 2012. "An institutional theory investigation of U.S. technology development trends since the mid-19th century," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 306-318.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jové Llopis, Elisenda & Segarra Blasco, Agustí, 1958-, 2015. "Innovation success: What is the role of innovation strategies?," Working Papers 2072/260961, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Department of Economics.
    2. Suneel Kunamaneni, 2019. "CHALLENGES IN MOVING FROM INCREMENTAL TO RADICAL LOW-COST INNOVATION IN EMERGING AND TRANSITION COUNTRIES: Institutional Perspectives Based on Rechargeable Battery Innovation in China and Point-of-Use," International Journal of Innovation Management (ijim), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 23(03), pages 1-36, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Elia, Stefano & Santangelo, Grazia D., 2017. "The evolution of strategic asset-seeking acquisitions by emerging market multinationals," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 26(5), pages 855-866.
    2. Hu, Helen Wei & Cui, Lin, 2014. "Outward foreign direct investment of publicly listed firms from China: A corporate governance perspective," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(4), pages 750-760.
    3. Sun, Sunny Li & Peng, Mike W. & Lee, Ruby P. & Tan, Weiqiang, 2015. "Institutional open access at home and outward internationalization," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 234-246.
    4. Anderson, John & Sutherland, Dylan & Severe, Sean, 2015. "An event study of home and host country patent generation in Chinese MNEs undertaking strategic asset acquisitions in developed markets," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 24(5), pages 758-771.
    5. Buckley, Peter J. & Elia, Stefano & Kafouros, Mario, 2014. "Acquisitions by emerging market multinationals: Implications for firm performance," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 611-632.
    6. Chen, Victor Zitian & Li, Jing & Shapiro, Daniel M., 2012. "International reverse spillover effects on parent firms: Evidences from emerging-market MNEs in developed markets," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 204-218.
    7. Fu, Xiaolan & Sun, Zhongjuan & Ghauri, Pervez N., 2018. "Reverse knowledge acquisition in emerging market MNEs: The experiences of Huawei and ZTE," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 202-215.
    8. Bilgili, Tsvetomira V. & Kedia, Ben L. & Bilgili, Hansin, 2016. "Exploring the influence of resource environments on absorptive capacity development: The case of emerging market firms," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 51(5), pages 700-712.
    9. Rui, Huaichuan & Cuervo-Cazurra, Alvaro & Annique Un, C., 2016. "Learning-by-doing in emerging market multinationals: Integration, trial and error, repetition, and extension," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 51(5), pages 686-699.
    10. Luo, Yadong & Zhang, Huan, 2016. "Emerging Market MNEs: Qualitative Review and Theoretical Directions," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 333-350.
    11. Wang, Chengqi & Hong, Junjie & Kafouros, Mario & Boateng, Agyenim, 2012. "What drives outward FDI of Chinese firms? Testing the explanatory power of three theoretical frameworks," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 425-438.
    12. Yoo, Dasun & Reimann, Felix, 2017. "Internationalization of Developing Country Firms into Developed Countries: The Role of Host Country Knowledge-Based Assets and IPR Protection in FDI Location Choice," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 23(3), pages 242-254.
    13. Wu, Hang & Chen, Jin & Jiao, Hao, 2016. "Dynamic capabilities as a mediator linking international diversification and innovation performance of firms in an emerging economy," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(8), pages 2678-2686.
    14. Buckley, Peter J. & Munjal, Surender & Enderwick, Peter & Forsans, Nicolas, 2016. "The role of experiential and non-experiential knowledge in cross-border acquisitions: The case of Indian multinational enterprises," Journal of World Business, Elsevier, vol. 51(5), pages 675-685.
    15. Alessia Amighini & Claudio Cozza & Elisa Giuliani & Roberta Rabellotti & Vittoria Scalera, 2015. "Multinational enterprises from emerging economies: what theories suggest, what evidence shows. A literature review," Economia e Politica Industriale: Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, Springer;Associazione Amici di Economia e Politica Industriale, vol. 42(3), pages 343-370, September.
    16. Ravi Ramamurti & Jenny Hillemann, 2018. "What is “Chinese” about Chinese multinationals?," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 49(1), pages 34-48, January.
    17. Buckley, Peter J. & Munjal, Surender & Enderwick, Peter & Forsans, Nicolas, 2016. "Cross-border acquisitions by Indian multinationals: Asset exploitation or asset augmentation?," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 986-996.
    18. Stoian, Carmen & Mohr, Alex, 2016. "Outward foreign direct investment from emerging economies: escaping home country regulative voids," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 25(5), pages 1124-1135.
    19. Bodas Freitas, Isabel Maria & Marques, Rosane Argou & Silva, Evando Mirra de Paula e, 2013. "University–industry collaboration and innovation in emergent and mature industries in new industrialized countries," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(2), pages 443-453.
    20. Yakob, Ramsin & Nakamura, H. Richard & Ström, Patrik, 2018. "Chinese foreign acquisitions aimed for strategic asset-creation and innovation upgrading: The case of Geely and Volvo Cars," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 70, pages 59-72.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:tefoso:v:82:y:2014:i:c:p:140-148. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/00401625 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.