科研管理 ›› 2020, Vol. 41 ›› Issue (3): 217-226.

• 论文 • 上一篇    下一篇

股权激励契约、技术创新与创新效率

黄新建,尤珊珊   

  1. 重庆大学经济与工商管理学院,重庆400044
  • 收稿日期:2019-07-04 修回日期:2019-12-16 出版日期:2020-03-20 发布日期:2020-03-24
  • 通讯作者: 尤珊珊
  • 基金资助:
    中央高校基本科研业务费科研专项(CQDXWL-2013-086,2013.12-2020.12)。

Equity incentive contract, technological innovation and innovation efficiency

Huang Xinjian, You Shanshan   

  1. School of Economics and Business Administration, Chongqing University, Chongqing 400044, China
  • Received:2019-07-04 Revised:2019-12-16 Online:2020-03-20 Published:2020-03-24

摘要: 本文以2010-2017年间中国A股上市公司为样本,运用多元线性回归、Tobit模型、PSM模型研究股权激励计划中契约要素对技术创新、创新效率的影响。研究发现:严格的行权条件减少了创新投入、增加了创新产出、提高了创新效率;较长的激励有效期增加了创新投入及产出、提高了创新效率,但是随着时间的延长,激励作用越弱,到第3年激励作用消失;核心员工股权激励增加了创新投入及产出,而高管股权激励减少了创新投入及产出。研究结论为企业设计恰当的股权激励契约要素提供实证证据。

关键词: 股权激励, 激励要素, 技术创新, 创新效率

Abstract: In the context of economic integration and increasing global market competition, innovation remains the core competitiveness. In the process of “mass entrepreneurial innovation”, innovation has become a strategic support for promoting high-quality development. However, China still faces the challenge of insufficient innovation ability. Enterprises in China that really should become the subject of technological innovation in a country lack the motivation and ability to innovate. Therefore, how to improve the innovation level and efficiency of enterprises is an inevitable problem in the course of China′s current economic development.The corporate governance mechanism caused by the agency problem between shareholders and managers is an important influencing factor of technological innovation. The governance mechanism determines the investment in research and development, the distribution of responsibilities, and the ownership of income. Wages and salaries based on the principle of performance are insufficient to encourage innovation. Equity incentive, as an important mean to alleviate agency problem, is more effective than traditional salary performance incentive. On the one hand, the characteristics of large investment and lagging returns in innovation activity make it faces a greater probability of failure. Equity incentive makes: when the innovation activity is successful, the stock price rises for a long time and rewards executives and employees to a greater extent; even if the innovation activity fails and the stock price declines, due to the limited downside risk of the options held by executives and employees, they only suffer a limited loss and tolerate for failure. On the other hand, a successful innovation activity requires teamwork, and it is almost impossible for a single executive or employee to complete a complex innovation activity. As a group incentive scheme, equity incentive can enhance cooperation among executives and employees, and encourage information sharing and social learning between innovators, leading to achieve greater innovation success. However, there is no consistent conclusion on whether equity incentive can promote technological innovation in existing literature. It has become too broad to simply study whether equity incentive can promote technological innovation. It is particularly important to establish a sound and effective incentive mechanism to promote innovation. This paper argues that reasonable and appropriate design of contract elements is the key of equity incentive to bring positive effect. To sum up, this paper will study the technological innovation from the perspective of the equity incentive contract elements, and empirically analyze the importance of reasonable contract elements to promote innovation.Taking the A-share listed companies from 2010 to 2017 as samples, this paper uses a multiple linear regression model to study the impact of performance conditions, incentive validity, and incentive objects on technological innovation and innovation efficiency. Among them, R&D investment, patent applications and grants are used to comprehensively measure technological innovation. The study finds that: firstly, strict performance conditions reduce technological innovation input, increase technological innovation output, and improve innovation efficiency. Innovation activity requires considerable cost which affects accounting profits.Therefore, in order to achieve strict performance assessment, it is necessary to reduce innovation input and increase innovation output at the same time. So, stricter performance conditions have a stronger incentive effect on incentive objects. Secondly, the long-term incentive validity period increases the input and output of technological innovation and improves the efficiency of innovation. However, as time goes on, the incentive effect of incentive validity period is weaker , and the incentive effect disappears in the third year. On the one hand, the long-term incentive validity period enables executives and employees to overcome short-sighted behavior, pay attention to the long-term development of the enterprise, and reduce the possibility of manipulating performance through earnings management. On the other hand, equity incentive lock capable executives and employees within the incentive validity, attracting and retaining more core technical personnel for the enterprise, thereby promoting technological innovation level. However, with the passage of time, the incentive period is shortened, and the incentive effect is weakened. The longer the incentive validity period , the greater the unpredictability in the future, and the smaller the discount value of future earnings,so the incentive effect may be weaker. Thirdly, non-executive employee stock options increase technological innovation input and output, while executive stock options reduce technological innovation input and output to a certain extent. Core employees have a more direct impact on technological innovation activities, while executives determine resource allocation, who have greater power may have self-interest behaviors. Executives have the ability and motivation to damage the company′s interests by manipulating performance levels to achieve performance conditions.In addition, a large number of robustness tests are performed in this paper. First, re-regress the model using multiple substitution variables. Second, since a large number of patent data of listed companies is zero, the Tobit model is used for correction. Third, the PSM model is used to reduce selectivity bias, and the individuals in the experimental group and the control group are matched for further research. The empirical results are consistent with the above conclusions.The empirical evidence in this paper has certain practical significance and enlightenment. First, the existing literature just studies equity incentive with technological innovation and the conclusions are still controversial. This paper studies technological innovation from the perspective of contract elements.It analyzes the importance of reasonable contract elements to promote innovation. Second, the existing researches mostly focus on innovation input and output, but less on innovation efficiency. This paper further studies the impact of equity incentive contract elements on innovation efficiency, and supplement relevant literature on the factors that affecting innovation efficiency to a certain extent. Third, the empirical results show that strict performance conditions, appropriate extension of the incentive validity period, and the selection of core employees as incentive objects have a better incentive effect on technological innovation. It can provide suggestions for enterprises to design equity incentive plans, so that companies can improve their innovation level and become the real innovation subject to promote economic development.

Key words: equity incentive, incentive elements, technological innovation, innovation efficiency