Abstract: Innovation persistence is of great significance for firms to build dynamic competitive advantage, but how to stimulate firms to be persistent in innovation is still a key question in academic fields. Most of the existing factors that influence innovation persistence emphasize the objective factors such as firm characteristics and external environment, while ignoring the internal cognitive causes, which weakens the explanatory power of existing research conclusions to some extent. The upper echelon theory points out that the organizational result is a mapping of TMT cognition, the core of which is that TMT has a strategic and lasting effect on the organization. Compared with other strategic choices, technological innovation has the characteristics of process complexity, human factor domination and lag in return, and persistent innovation relies heavily on TMT′s judgment and continuous attention and investing lots of resources to realize knowledge accumulation, so the influence of TMT cognition can be more significant.Based on upper echelon theory and cognitive perspective, TMT cognition is extended to TMT cognition level and TMT cognition distinctiveness which are captured by text analysis method and text vector method respectively, and then analyze how different characteristics of TMT cognition affect firm innovation persistence from theoretical and empirical aspects. Based on listed manufacturing companies in China, the results show that the stronger the TMT cognition of technological innovation, the more innovation persistence is enhanced. The more distinctive the TMT cognitive of technological innovation, the more significant the innovation persistence. The two aspects above generate a mutual enhancement effect. Besides, we find that when the industry is tightly regulated, the positive effect of innovation persistence is significantly weaker. This shows that TMT cognition is important for innovation strategic decisions, but decision-making context will affect whether TMT are "doing what you say" or "talking without doing" in terms of innovation.The theoretical contribution of this paper lies in three aspects: First, this paper integrates upper echelon theory and cognitive psychology while applying cognitive factor which is of long-term stability into innovation persistence study, further extending the upper echelon theory, which indicates that the cognitive process of TMT can also affect technological innovation in the long term in addition to individual characteristic factors. Second, it extends the characteristic dimension of TMT innovation cognition and deepens the research content of how the cognition of different characteristics affects firm innovation, which responds to Nadkarni′s call that "multi-dimensional analysis should be carried out on the broad-based cognition". Existing research is limited to focusing on the cognitive intensity of innovation, which restricts the theoretical interpretation of reality. This paper also considers the two dimensions of TMT innovation cognition level and distinctiveness, which reflects the characteristics of TMT cognition more comprehensively, and finds that the different characteristics of TMT cognition have direct and interactive effects on innovation persistence. Third, the situational mechanism of TMT cognition research is enriched. Unlike previous studies which most directly associate TMT cognition with firm behavior and performance, this study applies h upper echelon theory and cognitive psychology to Chinese situations, further supporting Ocasio′s views on cognitive context principles and expanding the application scope of these theories. Specifically, this paper puts forward and tests industrial regulation on the relationship between TMT cognition and innovation persistence. Industry regulation is a typical factor with Chinese characteristics, so the discussion of its restricted role is of great theoretical and practical significance.The research conclusion of this paper brings positive enlightenment to how manufacturing firms improve innovation persistence. First, TMT should strengthen their attention to innovation strategy. Besides focusing on their own innovation and development, TMT should actively search for new knowledge inside and outside the industry crossing the boundaries of the organization to discover new elements, so as to be a flexible response to new technologies and opportunities and avoid cognitive convergence and labeling. Second, the government should deepen efforts to streamline administration and delegate power to avoid unreasonable administrative interference in various industries，and give full play to the innovative functions of TMT and transform their innovative willingness into practice.

Key words: TMT cognition level, TMT cognition distinctiveness, innovation persistence, industrial regulation, text vectorization