The Effects Of External Innovation Networks Of Enterprises On Incremental And Radical Innovation

Both innovation network and absorptive capacity are very important for firm’s technological innovation. In the context of open innovation, organizational learning and innovation has evolved from the traditional process based on individual behavior and the linear model to the highly interactive and recurrent network process. Many researchers have emphasized the important role of absorptive capacity in the innovation network, but also pointed out that the innovation network has a great impact on firm’s absorptive capacity and technological innovation, however, not many of these scholars considered their relationship at the same framework in their empirical research. The status in quo of research provides a new research opportunities and research perspective for other researchers.Based on previous studies, the conceptual model about the interaction among network size, tie strength, network centrality and organizational absorptive capacity, incremental innovation and radical innovation is constructed and the related research hypotheses are raised, then an empirical study is conducted based on innovation-oriented enterprises in Guangdong Province.The results give us many useful illuminations. Firstly, Enterprise absorptive capacity has a multi-dimensional nature, including exploratory learning, transformative learning and exploitative learning three higher-order factors, as well as the identification, assimilation, maintenance, reactivation, transformation and application of external knowledge outside enterprises six lower-order factors. Secondly, network size and tie strength directly effect Enterprise overall absorptive capacity and radical innovation, but their influences on incremental innovation are not significant. And network centrality directly affects the overall absorptive capacity, but iits influences on incremental and radical innovation are significant. Thirdly, the overall absorptive capacity of innovation-oriented enterprises in Guangdong plays a full intermediary role in the effects of network size and tie strength on incremental innovation and the effects of network centrality on incremental and radical innovation, and plays a part intermediary role in the effects of network size and tie strength on radical innovation at the same time. Fourthly, based on the analysis of our survey sample, the overall effects of network size and network centrality on radical innovation are higher than their effects on incremental innovation, but the overall effects of tie strength on incremental innovation is higher than their effect on radical innovation.On the basis of the above conclusions, the multiple linear regression models are further used to analyze the effects of organizational learning process based on absorptive capacity and its complementarity on incremental and radical innovation, and then the regulatory roles of environmental turbulence are analyzed in above effects.The results show that, as basic composition of firm’s absorptive capacity, exploratory learning and exploitative learning still paly a catalytic role through their complementary effect with the transformative learning in addition to the direct effects on incremental and radical innovation of innovation-oriented enterprises, however, transformative learning has no significantly direct impact on incremental and radical innovation and only play a catalytic role through complementary effects with the other organizational learning process.At the same time, the results also show that the degree of turbulence of the technology and market environment play an equally positive regulation in the effects of absorptive capacity and its basic compositions on incremental innovation, but absorptive capacity and its exploitative learning process have a greater role in promoting the radical innovation of innovation-oriented enterprises in Guangdong.