Abstract
Open innovation theory believes that external knowledge acquisition is the key to gaining competitive advantage. This research aimed to examine the relationship between external knowledge acquisition, environmental innovation, and performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). This study divides the external knowledge acquisition of enterprises into external technical knowledge acquisition and external market knowledge acquisition, and examines this theoretical framework with environmental innovation as a mediator. Using a sample of 416 Chinese SMEs, empirical results revealed that high levels of technical knowledge acquisition and market knowledge acquisition were positively related to SMEs’ performance. The positive impact of technical knowledge acquisition is mainly embodied through economic performance; the positive impact of market knowledge acquisition is mainly embodied through environment performance. Meanwhile, environmental innovation plays a significant mediating role in the relationship between external knowledge acquisition and enterprise performance; environmental performance plays a significant mediating role in the relationship between environmental innovation and economic performance. This paper provides several managerial implications for managers and policy makers to improve SMEs’ performance.
Highlights
With the increasingly heated competition in the international market, knowledge resource in the age of knowledge economy is increasingly important; lack of knowledge is one important obstacle for enterprises in coping with environmental challenges [1]
The results indicate that the effect of environmental innovation on environmental performance is greater than the effect on economic performance
This research gap is in line with recent research of Burak Erkut [69], who integrated market knowledge into innovation and enterprise success by focusing on the evolution process of the enterprise resource planning (ERP) market
Summary
With the increasingly heated competition in the international market, knowledge resource in the age of knowledge economy is increasingly important; lack of knowledge is one important obstacle for enterprises in coping with environmental challenges [1]. Open innovation research has clarified that external knowledge acquisition has a significant positive impact on corporate performance [2], and some scholars brought possible intervening variables to the relationship between the two. Lee et al brought organizational creativity into the relationship between knowledge and corporate performance [3]; Ahn et al regarded product innovation and process innovation as the intermediary, so as to evaluate the influence of knowledge on corporate performance [4]; some scholars regarded new product development as the intermediary, so as to analyze the influence mechanism of external knowledge acquisition on corporate performance. Few researches analyze the influence process of external knowledge acquisition on corporate performance from the perspective of environmental innovation. The existing researches about external knowledge focus on technical knowledge, neglecting the importance of market knowledge; the corporate performance they pay attention to is mainly financial performance, while they neglect the non-financial performances that are very important such as environmental performance
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