Strengthening the deep integration of industry, university, and research institutions led by enterprises—An analysis on the TMT’s academic experience

加强企业主导的产学研深度融合—高管学术经历视角

Abstract

China is entering a new stage of high-quality development, which relies on innovation. As the mainstay of the national innovation system, the deep integration of industry, university, and research institutions is crucial for enhancing China's innovation capability. Strengthening enterprise-led integration of industry, university, and research institutions is an important strategy implemented by the Chinese government to drive innovation-driven development. The government encourages professionals who have worked in universities or research institutions to engage in scientific research or management positions in enterprises. As a result, there has been a gradual increase in the proportion of high-level executives in Chinese companies with academic backgrounds. This undoubtedly has an impact on the innovative decision-making behaviors of these companies. This article utilizes data from listed Chinese companies between 2008 and 2020 to explore the influence of the top management team’s academic backgrounds on the depth of industry-university-research integration led by enterprises, as well as its underlying channels of impact. The study reveals the following findings: Firstly, the top management team’s academic backgrounds significantly strengthen the integration between enterprises and universities or research institutions, increasing the output of collaborative patents by 5.2% and raising the proportion of collaborative patents in total patents by 0.7%. This positive effect remains valid after conducting a series of robustness checks, including variable transformations, sample adjustments, staggered-DID, PSM-DID, and 2SLS regressions. Secondly, the mechanism analysis suggests that the top management team’s academic backgrounds can enhance a company's social capital, leading to increased collaboration between the company and the academic institutions where the top managers had their academic experience. top management team’s academic backgrounds serve as a positive signal of a company's capacity for industry-university-research integration, allowing them to obtain more government subsidies in this area. Furthermore, the top management team’s academic backgrounds leave an imprinting effect, resulting in higher R&D investment and intensity in companies with academic executives. Further analysis reveals that the positive effects of the top management team’s academic backgrounds are only present among executives with technical backgrounds. Additionally, the impact of the top management team’s academic backgrounds is more significant in state-owned enterprises compared to non-state-owned enterprises. This is because the top management team’s academic backgrounds notably promote the collaboration between SOEs and research institutions. However, there is no significant difference in collaboration with universities between state-owned and non-state-owned enterprises. Moreover, the degree of intellectual property rights protection in the region where a company is located has a greater influence on the positive effects of the top management team’s academic backgrounds on industry-university-research integration. In conclusion, this article proposes several recommendations to strengthen enterprise-led industry-university-research integration. Firstly, it is essential to establish channels that facilitate the integration of talent and innovation chains. Encouraging companies to attract high-level professionals from academia, particularly those with technical expertise, can leverage the resource effects, signal effects, and research-oriented tendencies of academic executives. Secondly, emphasis should be placed on leveraging the advantages of state-owned enterprises in industry-university-research integration. Encouraging deep collaboration between state-owned enterprises and research institutions in core technological fields is crucial. For non-state-owned enterprises, in addition to promoting talent exchange and mobility with universities and research institutions, leveraging their market-oriented advantages and enhancing application and market-driven approaches is important. Thirdly, the national and regional governments need to further improve intellectual property protection laws and regulations, clarify ownership and disposal of intellectual property rights, reduce barriers to industry-university-research integration, and improve collaboration efficiency. Furthermore, local governments should actively improve the business environment by facilitating connections between enterprises and universities or research institutions, enhancing the precision and closeness of university-industry linkage, and promoting deep integration of technology and industry.