Research On The Cooperation Network Of Complex Knowledge And Its Impact On Urban Innovation Performance

In the era of knowledge economy,new knowledge has been considered as the foundation and derivation of innovation.Knowledge,especially complex knowledge,has increasingly become the critical point of maintaining competitive advantage in cities and a decisive force in promoting urban economic growth and innovation efficiency.With the acceleration of the innovation process and the improvement of knowledge complexity,any independent innovation entity cannot obtain all the resources of innovation.Therefore,the cooperation has become more closer,and the cooperation model has gradually shifted towards networking,which further affects the innovation capabilities of various regions.However,existing research has rarely addressed the distribution and evolution of complex knowledge in Chinese cities,or the relationship between their collaborative networks and urban innovation performance.During the critical period of innovation-driven development,it is extremely important to study the innovation cooperation network of complex knowledge in Chinese cities,and its relationship with urban innovation performance in order to understand the economic growth of Chinese citiesIn this paper,by using patent authorization data from 297 prefecture-level and above cities in China from 1985 to 2019,we first quantify the complexity of knowledge and characterize its distribution features.Then the development and evolution of complex knowledge cooperation networks from the perspective of multi-level networks are revealed.Furthermore,the formation mechanism of cooperative connections through multidimensional proximity is explored.Finally,starting with the characteristics of network structure,we study the impact of intra city and inter city cooperation networks and their interactions on urban innovation performance,with the hope of further revealing the characteristics and mechanisms of knowledge innovation development.The main conclusions are as follows:(1)As innovation becomes increasingly difficult and knowledge complexity grows,more and more knowledge innovation takes the form of cooperation,especially local cooperation within the city.This is mainly due to the strong local stickiness of complex knowledge with its difficulty in being replicated and imitated.During this period,the intensity of urban cooperation and urban innovation capacity,represented by coastal or developed cities,have significantly increased,and the dominant mode of cooperation is gradually changing from academic institution cooperation to enterprise cooperation.(2)In the field of complex knowledge innovation,whether it is a collaborative network formed by innovation entities within a city or by cities outside the city,the density and intensity of cooperation continue to grow.The internal networks of developed cities,represented by Beijing,focus on universities and industrial enterprises,and are at the core of external collaborative networks.In today’s particularly developed transportation and communications,geographical distance remains an important influencing factor for cooperation,and technological and social proximity can also facilitate cooperation.(3)The scale and density of innovation cooperation networks within a city can affect the efficiency of information dissemination and interaction among entities,and affect the innovation performance of the city;The central location of a city in an external innovation cooperation network is conducive to widely and efficiently accessing heterogeneous resources,which will have a significant positive impact on improving urban innovation performance.The two can also play a joint role: the size of the urban internal network and its central position in the external network form a substitute role,and the density of the urban internal network and its central position in the external network form a complementary role.