Research on the Differentiated Impact Mechanism of Parent Company Shareholding and Managerial Ownership on Subsidiary Responsive Innovation: Empirical Analysis Based on ‘Principal–Agent’ Framework

Under the dynamic competition situation, the innovation competition interaction between enterprises will take the form of mutual responding, while the formulation and implementation of responsive innovation strategy will be influenced by both shareholders and managers in the principal–agent relationship. In our research, we try to understand how the difference of governance logic between shareholders and managers affects innovation interaction strategy of enterprises. In order to achieve this research goal, this study takes all eligible listed companies (from 2007 to 2016) in China’s stock market as samples. The results show that the parent company shareholding has a negative impact on the subsidiary responsive innovation, while companies whose managers hold more shares select the relatively positive strategy responsive innovation. Moreover, the degree of separation between ownership and control rights and the external institutional environment can moderate the above relationship. Relevant conclusions can provide some reference value for the formulation of responsive innovation decision of listed companies and provide new insights for the design of parent–subsidiary corporate governance structure and the design of managerial equity incentive mechanism in the context of corporate group governance.