Research On The Impact Of Boundary-Spanning Search On Innovation Performance Of Latecomer Firm

With the intensification of international competition,how to break through the late-starting disadvantages by Latecomer Firms and realize the leap-type pursuit for incumbent firms becomes the hot issue in the strategic management field.Local Latecomer Firms in China face up with a great difference with incumbent firms in technical accumulation,market shares and relational depth.Only depending on internal knowledge accumulation of organizations is difficult to achieve overtaking of incumbent firms,but it needs external knowledge to promote self-innovative development,especially for heterogeneous knowledge.The Boundary-Spanning Search is an important approach for enterprises to gain heterogeneous knowledge.It has become the key for Latecomer Firms to enrich knowledge foundation and improve innovation performance.However,there are fewer studies on Latecomer Firms in the current Boundary-Spanning Search field.The acting path and influence mechanism of Boundary-Spanning Search for innovation performance of Latecomer Firms are still unclear.It is even rarer to study the effect of Boundary-Spanning Search on the innovation performance of Latecomer Firms considering different levels of Strategic Flexibility.Therefore,based on the Latecomer Firm theory theory and the Open Innovation theory,this thesis follows the research idea of "literature summarization--hypothesis proposal--questionnaire design--data collection--empirical analysis" and gradually deepens.Firstly,the thesis sorts out relevant literatures about Boundary-Spanning Search,Absorption Capacity and Strategic Flexibility.Based on literature study and theory,the thesis deduces the conceptual model and research assumption of this study.Next,according to the assumed model,the thesis designs the questionnaire to investigate samples and collect data.Also,the thesis uses descriptive statistical analysis,reliability and validity,correlation analysis and hypothesis testing.By virtue of SPSS22.0 and AMOS22.0 data analysis software,the thesis conducts the empirical test for data collected from 328 valid samples and conducts the in-depth analysis and demonstration for test results.Based on the research results,the thesis draws the following conclusions: technology-oriented,market-oriented and business model Boundary-Spanning Search have the significant positive influences on innovation performance of Latecomer Firms.Also,Absorption Capacity is the valid metavariable between them and develops a mediating effect.Furthermore,under the different Strategic Flexibility,the role of technology-oriented,market-oriented and business model Boundary-Spanning Search on innovation performance of Latecomer Firms is slightly changed,shown as follows: when Latecomer Firms have the high Strategic Flexibility,Latecomer Firms have the stronger dependency on technology-oriented Boundary-Spanning Search,market-oriented Boundary-Spanning Search and business model Boundary-Spanning Search.This study provides the scientific theoretical support and method guidance for local Latecomer Firms in China to improve innovation performance through Boundary-Spanning Search,so as to break through low-end locking of value chain,step over capacity trap,and realize leap-type pursuit for incumbent firms.