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Prior literature on ownership suggests that in the majority of cases, state ownership in state-owned enterprises (SOEs) is not an optimal structure for firm performance, especially in emerging economies. Mixed-ownership structures are designed to overcome this disadvantage. However, their impacts on innovation are not well understood. We examine whether and how SOEs’ innovation efforts benefit from mixed-ownership reform, using a sample of 375 publicly listed SOEs operating in China between 2003 and 2019. We discuss principal–principal and principal–agent conflicts in SOEs and argue that the increase in managerial autonomy that accompanies mixed-ownership reform releases SOEs from state control and orients them toward engagement with market forces, encouraging higher levels of innovation. Our results suggest that both the frequency and the impact of innovation in SOEs are improved by mixed-ownership reform. We further find that this relationship is more pronounced when SOEs are affiliated with the central government, and it is strengthened through an anticorruption policy. This study provides fresh insights into the role of mixed-ownership reform in emerging economies.

This article aims to investigate how firms react to their industry peers’ adoption of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) under the condition of resource constraints. Due to the complexity and uncertainty of M&A, firms have great difficulty in imitating their peers’ M&A strategies and thereby remaining competitive with these other companies. Using a dataset of publicly listed firms in China from 2011 to 2015, our empirical study provides strong evidence that peer firms’ M&A have a significantly positive effect on corporate research and development (R&D) decisions, which is measured as R&D intensity. Additionally, we find that peer firms that attract more analyst coverage have a greater impact on the focal firm's R&D intensity. Furthermore, we reveal that the influence of peers is more prominent in highly competitive markets. Our findings are robustly supported by alternative sampling, proxies, and estimation techniques. By shedding new light on competitive dynamics and signaling theory, this study advances our understanding of what determines innovation decisions and contributes to our knowledge of the behavioral consequences of M&A.

This article studies whether and how mergers and acquisitions (M&A) intensity makes an impact on a firm's postacquisition innovation. By differentiating the types of innovation, we show that M&A has differential effects on postacquisition radical innovation and incremental innovation. Using a publicly listed firm sample in China from 2011 to 2015, our empirical results provide support that M&A intensity has an inverted U-shaped effect on radical innovation, and has a positive and significant impact on incremental innovation. Furthermore, we introduce Chief Executive Officer (CEO) career background as a contingency factor, showing that the inverted U-shaped relationship between M&A intensity and radical innovation is more pronounced in firms with technical CEOs than in those with nontechnical CEOs, and the positive relationship between M&A intensity and incremental innovation is more pronounced in firms with nontechnical CEOs than in those with technical CEOs. Our findings add to the understanding of organizational consequences of M&A and the role of strategical leadership in the relationship between M&A intensity and firm innovation.

Transport infrastructure has been found to shape various outcomes of economic organizations by lowering travel costs and improving market access. In this article, we examine the spillover effect of highways on firm-level productivity and introduce innovation as a potential underlying mechanism. We argue that connection to national highways overcomes the localization of knowledge spillover by connecting ideas, information, knowledge, and talent across regions, which further improves firm productivity. Using a manufacturing sample from 1998 to 2007 in the context of China, we find a positive relationship between connection to the highways and firm productivity, and this relationship is mediated by innovation performance. Our results also suggest that such a mediating effect is strengthened when a firm is located in a region with greater market liberalization or intermediary development. Our findings add to the knowledge of economic geography by providing new insights into the interplay between infrastructure and organizational outcomes.

Facing severe environmental degradation around the world, green innovation is considered as an effective way to achieve sustainable competitive advantages. How to motivate firms to engage in green innovation is becoming increasingly important for both the practice and academics. Grounded in upper echelons theory, this study establishes a link between humble CEOs and corporate green innovation. The developed theoretical framework argues that CEO humility, an important but unexplored virtue and psychological trait, has positive effects on green innovation. Furthermore, we also propose that green business strategy mediates this relationship and the successful integration of marketing and technology could strengthen strategy implementation and make being green worthwhile. Supportive evidence is found for these ideas with empirical results based on a moderated mediation analysis of a sample of Chinese manufacturing firms. These findings extend the understanding of the importance of CEO characteristics for firm-level strategies and green achievements.

How does transport infrastructure spur innovation? This article examines the knowledge spillover effects of the construction of high-speed railways (HSR) in China. Using a database listing patent application information and Chinese city samples over the period 2005–2015, we find that the connection to HSR networks significantly increases the number of patents at the city level. Moreover, our results show that more collaborative or radical innovations and those operating in technologically complex industries benefit more from HSR. Our findings extend prior work on transport infrastructure and the literature on the geography of innovation and provide a comprehensive understanding of how various innovation outcomes benefit in different ways from reduced travel costs.