Abstract: How to integrate strategically specialized knowledge is critical for high-tech entrepreneurial firms to win in the market competition. Although some scholars propose “strategic integration of knowledge” in their research, its modes and effects have not been explored. Planned strategy and emergent strategy are two different modes of strategic formation. Planned strategy emphasizes conscious strategy formulation before actions while emergent strategy is a mode of incremental strategy formation through action and trial-error learning. These two strategic formation modes can be combined for firms to achieve superior performance. According to knowledge-based theory and a perspective of strategic knowledge management, knowledge integration is critical for firms to develop organizational capability for value creation and capture, which is required to be consistent with these strategic formation modes for realizing the maximized strategic value of knowledge. In this research, we use an exploratory multi-case study of 4 Chinese high-tech entrepreneurial firms to explore strategic integration modes of knowledge and their relationship with high-tech entrepreneurial firms’ competitive advantage in the context of China’s transition economy. To ensure the validity of case study, we collected data from a variety of sources. Specifically, the first-hand data was collected from the field observation, survey and also the semi-structured interviews with the entrepreneurs and top management team members about the knowledge integration practices in the process of strategic formation in these firms. And the second-hand data is mainly acquired from the documents provided by the interviewed firms and the news on the website such as Baidu and firm homepage. These data can form triangle case evidence for our analysis. According tothe 24-hour rule, we kept a record of interviews and have a discussion about them on the day when we finish the interviews. Our research data is mainly the first-hand data collected from case interviews. And we also use second-hand data to make up with the inefficiency of interview documents and avoid the bias caused by retrospective interpretation and impression management. To analyze strategic integration modes of knowledge and its relationship with competitive advantage in high-tech entrepreneurial firms, we put the documents into codes base on grounded theory. In the case analysis, the words and phrases related to strategy formation and knowledge integration are coded and conceptualized into first-order concepts firstly. Then, second-order concepts are formed through selective coding. Finally, we provide clear definitions for emergent integration and planned integration of knowledge and put forward the relevant propositions.Results of case analysis indicate that strategic integration modes of knowledge involve the processes of synthesizing and exploiting internal and external knowledge to formulate or realize strategic goals, which include emergent integration and planned integration of knowledge. Specifically, emergent integration of knowledge emphasizes strategic experimentation, learning by doing and knowledge reconstruction to formulate strategic goals gradually. While planned integration of knowledge refers to the realization of existing strategic goals through planned learning with predefined goals to make up with the knowledge gap. We find that either emergent integration or planned integration of knowledge has a positive effect on high-tech entrepreneurial firms’ competitive advantage. Under high uncertainty, the strategic goals in high-tech entrepreneurial firms are always changed so that these firms are required to apply emergent integration of knowledge to integrate real-time information flexibly for dynamic strategy adjustment with the environmental changes. While planned integration of knowledge provides high-tech entrepreneurial firms with clear directions and specific order for knowledge integration to realize the existing strategic goals with fewer resources. Moreover, we also find that emergent integration and planned integration are not mutually exclusive but complementary, which is consistent with the dominant academic view about the relationship between emergent strategy and planned strategy. Scholars in strategy domain argue that firms can achieve the optimal market position by combining emergent strategy and planned strategy in the meantime. Therefore, we propose that the interaction between emergent integration of knowledge and planned integration of knowledge has a positive effect on high-tech entrepreneurial firms’ competitive advantage. Overall, we build the conceptual research model based on the relationship between strategic integration modes of knowledge and high-tech entrepreneurial firms’ competitive advantage.Our research has important theoretical implications in several folds. Strategic integration of knowledge is the core process of strategic knowledge management. However, few scholars provide clear definition for the concept of “strategic integration of knowledge”. Our research opens the black box of strategic integration of knowledge and enriches the perspective of strategic knowledge management by clarifying its different modes and dimensions of each mode based on exploratory multi-case study. Moreover, although scholars widely agree that strategic integration of knowledge is important for firms’ survival and development, few scholars provide specific and systematic explanations for how high-tech entrepreneurial firms integrate diverse entrepreneurial knowledge to achieve competitive advantage. Therefore, our research enriches and extends knowledge-based theory and knowledge integration literature by exploring the relationship between strategic integration modes of knowledge and high-tech entrepreneurial firms’ competitive advantage with case evidence.Our findings also provide high-tech entrepreneurial firms with important theoretical guidelines about how to capture the strategic value of knowledge efficiently and effectively in the context of transition economies. On the one hand, transition economies characterized by emerging markets and fast-changing institutions provide high-tech entrepreneurial firms with diverse platforms to explore new opportunities to discover and create new market demands. In an effort to achieve greater growth, high-tech entrepreneurial firms are required to apply emergent integration of knowledge to exploit a variety of knowledge for strategy adjustment to capture new opportunities. On the other hand, how to provide specialized products or services with higher quality at a faster pace is the key for high-tech entrepreneurial firms to gain profits under fierce competition in their industries. Planned integration of knowledge helps high-tech entrepreneurial firms to quickly capitalize existing opportunities base on clear strategic goals at a lower cost, and thus these firms can survive in the fierce market competition. As a result, high-tech entrepreneurial firms need to leverage the complementary effect of emergent integration of knowledge and planned integration of knowledge to explore and exploit opportunities for sustainable competitive advantage in the context of transition economies.

Key words: strategic integration modes of knowledge, high-tech entrepreneurial firms, competitive advantage, multi-case study