How technology search facilitate technological innovation capability reconfiguration: Empirical study under emerging economy

Abstract

The reconfiguration of technological innovation capability is an emergency issue for emerging economy. However, the “complementary or substitution” argument about the relationship among search strategies existed in recent studies, which hinders the reconfiguration of technological innovation capability. Thus, based on data from 253 high-tech enterprises, this paper employed cluster analysis and multi-logistic regression method to study the relationship between technology search and types of technological innovation capability during its reconfiguration process. There are several important results. Firstly, there are two dominant types of technological innovation capability during each stage of capability reconfiguration: a) knowledge assimilation capability; b) knowledge assimilation and creation capability. Secondly, there are different technology search facilitate each type of technological innovation capability during its reconfiguration: a)compared to other search strategy, the synergy between external boundary spanning search and internal boundary spanning search strategy, more easily lead to knowledge assimilation capability(compared to other capability structure types); b)compared to other knowledge search strategy, external boundary spanning search is more likely to result in knowledge assimilation and creation capability (compared to other types of capability structure types). This paper not only contributes dynamic capability and capability reconfiguration perspectives, but also has managerial implications.