Abstract:

As the important component of the national innovation system, the collaboration among enterprise, university and research institution can accelerate the industrialization of scientific and technological achievements and promote the innovative development of industry-university-research. However, the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research is essentially a kind of knowledge production activity, and its spillover characteristics will lead to “Market Failure” of the innovative production. Furthermore, there are often differences in the interest appeal and starting point of the three subjects, which will also lead to the instability of the collaborative innovation system of industry-university-research and the difficulty to achieve a win-win situation. Therefore, it is necessary to provide support from the institutional aspect to create a good external collaborative innovation environment. As a non-market force of “Helping Hand”, institutional support can help to make up for “Market Failure” and provide corresponding support and assistance to the three subjects of industry-university-research so as to achieve the overall collaboration effect of “1+1+1>3”. The existing literature pays attention to the influence of institutional factor on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research, but have not examined the issue of the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research from the classification perspective of formal and informal institutional support. So, how do formal and informal institutional support influence the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research? In the influence process, as an important internal resource, does the absorptive capacity of enterprise play the role of “moderator”? At the same time, as an important factor reflecting the cooperative relationship, does the cooperative tightness of industry-university-research play the role of “mediator”? In response to these problems, according to the dichotomy institution theory, dividing the institutional support into two dimensions named formal and informal institutional support, with the data from 30 provinces, cities and regions in China during 2010-2016, based on the construction of the synergy degree model to calculate the collaborative innovation degree of industry-university-research and the measurement of the relevant variables, the paper selects the fixed-effect model and uses panel calibration standard error (PCSE) method to analyze the impact of institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research, and explore the moderation effect of absorptive capacity of enterprise and the mediation effect of cooperative tightness of industry-university-research in the influence process, so as to open up the “Black Box” that institutional support influences the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research.The research results of this paper contain three aspects. Firstly, institutional support is an important influence factor of the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research. Both formal institutional support and informal institutional support have positive influence on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research. Secondly, the absorptive capacity of enterprise strengthens the influence of formal institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research, but weakens the influence of informal institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research. This shows that the absorptive capacity of enterprise moderates the impact of institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research, and its moderation effect is situation-dependent. That is to say, the absorptive capacity of enterprise has differentiated roles in different institutional environments. Finally, the cooperative tightness of industry-university-research plays the partial mediation effect in the influence process of formal and informal institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research. This shows that there is indeed a path in the influence process of institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research, and institutional support can influence the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research through the mediate link of close cooperation among the three subjects.Through the empirical research, the paper can provide the following enlightenments. Firstly, the institutional support should play the positive influence, make full use of “Visible Hand” to make up for “Market Failure” and improve the level of the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research. The relevant department should grasp the rhythm of fund subsidy, release good institutional signal, provide adequate financial support, control and supervise the use of subsidy fund to improve the utilization efficiency of fund. At the same time, the relevant department should attach importance to the training of scientific talent, and improve the comprehensive quality of talent in the region to provide talent support for the development of the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research. Secondly, with the different institution supports, the absorptive capacity of enterprise should play the role rationally. The enterprise should cultivate its absorptive and perceptual capability, and help other subjects to understand institutional information better, so as to improve the influence of formal institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research. In addition, to avoid focusing too much on the internal system while neglecting the external informal institutional support, when cultivating its own absorptive capacity, the enterprise should be more sensitive to capture and share information, form flexible strategic thinking, and establish a special response mechanism to prevent the negative influence caused by the internal locking effect of the absorptive capacity of enterprise. Finally, it needs to build a bridge that institutional support influences the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research through the cooperation of the three subjects. The three subjects of industry-university-research should strengthen communication and contact among each other, and adopt the corresponding negotiation and contract mechanism to realize the influence of formal institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research from the individual to the system. In addition, the three subjects of industry-university-research need to rely on the internal stable and efficient cooperation network within the system to ensure the collision and fusion of different culture and behavioral norm, and finally realize the influence of informal institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research.The paper still has some shortcomings that need to be further overcome. Firstly, institutional support can be divided into three levels including government, organization and individual, which can also be divided into internal support and external support. The future research may examine the impact of the combination of formal and informal institutional support with hierarchy, and internality and externality of institutional support on the collaborative innovation of industry-university-research. Secondly, the future research may obtain sample data to verify the results of this study through the questionnaire, or select the typical cases for tracking analysis.

Key words:  institutional support, collaborative innovation of industry-university-research, absorptive capacity of enterprise, cooperative tightness of industry-university-research