Financial Constraints, Financing Channels And R&D Investment

R&D investment is an important corporate data that government needs to pay attention to especially when Chinese economy is facing essential transition. Considering the diversity of R&D phase and cash flow condition, we divide the corporations listed in growth enterprise market(GEM) into four kinds, collect panel data from 2011 to 2014, and discuss if each kind faces the identical financial constraints and their preferred channels to finance R&D investment.Using panel data and q model, our analyses prove that listed corporations in GEM are facing financial constraints; operating cash flow is still main capital source of R&D investment. If cash flow was favorable, corporations whose R&D project is in development phrase would prefer to finance R&D by debt and equity channels, and bear more loosely financial constraints. If cash flow was deficiency, debt financial channel no more support R&D, corporations in development phrase would more rely on equity financing, while corporations in research phrase just maintain low level of R&D investment by cash in hold.