转型经济背景下国有和民营后发企业创新能力的追赶动力学：一个仿真研究

The Catching Up Dynamics of Innovative Capability in SOE and POE in Transition Economy: A Simulation Study

追赶是发展中国家后发企业战略的关键。基于中国汽车产业上汽和吉利的比较案例研究,研究构建了国有和民营两类异质后发企业创新能力追赶动力学的数学模型,其中包含了后发企业追赶到政府政策导向的反馈效应,并尝试采用系统动力学方法对后发企业追赶进行仿真并实施了多种实验。具体而言,考察了民营企业进入时机、民营企业相对于国有企业的可见度窘境以及政府政策导向的政策延迟时间等变量在国有和民营企业创新能力追赶动力学中扮演的角色。分析结果表明,国有企业和民营企业的创新能力追赶过程具有交互式和非线性特征。民营企业进入时机越早、民营企业可见度窘境越低以及政府政策延迟时间越低不仅促进民营企业的创新能力追赶,而且还有利于国有企业的创新能力追赶。更精练的仿真分析结果还发现了一些非线性特征,即这些因素的效应在创新能力追赶的初期和后期不太明显,但在追赶的中期则非常明显。造成这些非线性结果的原因是模型结构的主导循环发生了转移。

Catching up is a key strategy for latecomer firms in China. Building on the comparative case study of SAIC and Geely on the Chinese automotive industry, this paper develops a formal mathematical model to understand the innovative capabilities and catch-up dynamics of two different latecomer firms, state owned enterprises（SOE）, and private owned enterprises（POE）. The model incorporates the feedback effect of latecomer firms＇ catch-up into governmental policy＇s reorientation. This study represents the first attempt to simulate the catch-up model using a system dynamics approach and various experiments. Specifically, the simulation analysis explores the effects of POE＇s entry timing, POE＇s visibility dilemma（relative to those of SOE）, and delay-time in governmental policy reorientation, on the innovative catch-up capabilities of SOE and POE. Overall, the simulation analysis suggests that the earlier the POE enters the industry, the lower the POE＇s visibility dilemma, the shorter the delay-time in policy reorientation, and the more likely catch-ups occurfor both POE and SOE. More refined analysis reveals some nonlinear features. The effects of these factors are more significant in early and late periods than in the middle period in the course of entire catch-up process. This results from a shift of dominant loops in the model. Besides, sensitivity analysis shows that the variations of model parameters don＇t change the qualitative pattern of model behavior（although some parameters produce more variations than others）, which indicates that the model is robust.This present study makes three contributions. First, unlike extant literature which focuses exclusively on latecomer firms, it develops a dynamics model in understanding innovative capabilities incorporating various entities（e.g., SOE, POE, Multinational corporation and government f latecomer country）. Second, the simulation results indicate that the impact of the characteristics of latecomer firms on catching up in innovative capabilities is complicated and nonlinear. However, studies employing traditional research methods（e.g., statistic analysis） cannot discover these findings. Finally, this study develops a catching up model with a temporal perspective, by introducing time and timing variables（e.g., POE＇s entry timing and policy delay-time）. Although various management theories involve time issues, their discussions are always peripheral. Moreover, this paper also offers policy and managerial implications. On one hand, the impact of POE＇s entry timing and policy delay-time shows that in order to catch up effectively, industry barrier artificially established by government in transition economy should be removed and the policy orientation should be flexible and reflect real changes in the industry. On the other hand, the dynamic model can serve as a flight simulator to train managers in SOE and POE. The model can help managers in latecomer firms better understand various catching-up scenarios with different configuration of POE＇s entry timing, visibility dilemma, and policy delay-time, thus facilitating the evaluation of future catching-up prospects.