Study On Business Performance Of Pharmaceutical Listed Companies Based On Technological Trajectory Theory

The pharmaceutical industry is a special and important part in the nationaleconomy and it relates the national health, social stability and the economicdevelopment. Since the reform and opening-up, the pharmaceutical industry in Chinahas been in a rapid development and its growth rate is higher than the average growthrate of national industry, and it has become the pillar industry in the national economy.The listed pharmaceutical companies embody considerable quantity of asset size andeconomic efficiency of the pharmaceutical industry, so their current developmentlevel and future development potential can represent the whole pharmaceuticalindustry in a certain degree. Furthermore, the business performances of listedpharmaceutical companies influence the future development of the pharmaceuticalindustry, so it is significant to research the business performance of listedpharmaceutical companies. At present, there exist three problems in the research onthe business performances of listed pharmaceutical companies: firstly, lots of studiesare restricted to the theories on industry development; secondly, thetechnology-driven features of pharmaceutical industry are neglected; thirdly, thesub-industries'features of pharmaceutical industry are neglected, there are a lots ofdifferences among the traditional Chinese pharmaceutical, chemical pharmaceuticaland biological pharmaceutical industry in the industry structure, core technology andmanufacturing techniques. In this circumstance, the purpose of this research is toillustrate the technological trajectory stage and features of the pharmaceutical industryusing the technological trajectory theories, research the business performances of thelisted pharmaceutical companies and empirically study the business performances oflisted companies and the relationship between the technology innovation abilities andthe business performance. And the research will help us to study the pharmaceuticalindustry in a new perspective, grasp the development characteristic and rule ofpharmaceutical industry and put forward theoretical basis for the policy maker in thegovernment and enterprises.In the empirical study of this dissertation, we used the statistical analysis method.And we chose 56 pharmaceutical listed companies on the Shanghai and ShenzhenStock Exchange from 2004 to 2008, and used factor analysis and syntheses analysis to evaluate and compare the business performance of listed companies in differenttechnological trajectories, and we used regression analysis to study the relationshipbetween technology innovation capability and business performance.After theoretical exploration and empirical analyses, there come to someimportant conclusions as follows:Firstly, the technological trajectory of chemicalpharmaceutical industry tends to the technological extreme, the technology innovationcapability has no effects on the business performance and the business performancesof most listed company are in the middle level in the industry. And chemicalpharmaceutical industry has the advantage in the profitability. Secondly, thetechnological trajectory of traditional Chinese pharmaceutical industry has been in thetechnology extreme, and the technology innovation capability has no effects on thebusiness performance. And the business performances of most listed company are inthe low level. Thirdly, the technological trajectory of biological pharmaceuticalindustry is in the growing stage, and the technology innovation capability has asignificantly positive effect on the business performance. There exists the polarityphenomenon in the business performance. Furthermore, the biological pharmaceuticalindustry has the advantage in the growth ability.Finally, based on the discussion of major findings, the dissertation concludedtheoretical contributions, managerial implications, and limitations of the studies andpotential avenues for future research were also presented.