Science Research Management ›› 2019, Vol. 40 ›› Issue (10): 14-24.

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Science and technology innovation policy, innovation ability and enterprise innovation

Li Zhan1, Zhang Liang1,2, Luo Exiang3   

  1. 1. Institute of Applied Economics, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, Shanghai 200020, China;
    2. Shanghai Development Research Center of Economy and Informatization, Shanghai 200020, China;
    3. Business School, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, Shanghai 200093, China
  • Received:2019-03-08 Revised:2019-07-16 Online:2019-10-20 Published:2019-10-23

Abstract: Scientific and technological innovation is a key measure to implement the quality, efficiency and motivation changes of China’s economic development. The focus of supply-side structural reform of scientific and technological innovation is to construct more accurate policies of scientific and technological innovation. However, due to the variety of science and technology innovation policies, the complexity of science and technology innovation system and the non-disclosure of policy evaluation subject information, The research on the mechanism of different science and technology innovation policies influencing on enterprise innovation lags behind the policy practice, and policy practice lacks theoretical support in turn. Therefore, basing on enterprise innovation and transformation of scientific and technological achievements, this paper evaluates the policy effect of scientific and technological innovation. Understanding the path heterogeneity of different scientific and technological innovation policies will help to build a more accurate scientific and technological innovation system from the supply side, in order to make up for the neglect of the evaluation of the effect of existing science and technology innovation policies on enterprise innovation and transformation of innovation achievements.
In this paper, 234 enterprises in Shanghai are taken as samples, based on the PLS path model, and the policy documents of Shanghai are studied and sorted out., the paper divided the science and technology innovation policies into six categories: tax policy, financial policy, talent policy, fiscal policy, intellectual property policy and external normative policy, and divides the enterprise innovation ability into three stages: innovation input ability, innovation intermediate transformation ability and innovation industrialization realization ability. This paper establishes six structural equation models to compare the policy path differences of six kinds of science and technology innovation policies in the three stages of enterprise innovation industrialization, and uses radar graphics to seek for the most effective stage of innovation policy by visualizing the policy effectiveness in the three stages.
By means of data analysis, this paper comes up with some interesting findings about the science and technology innovation policy, innovation ability and enterprise innovation.
Firstly, six kinds of innovation policies have heterogeneous impacts on the path of enterprise innovation. Fiscal policies and external normative policies only have direct positive impacts on the innovation input ability, while financial policies have direct positive impacts on the innovation input ability and innovation intermediate transformation ability. Intellectual property policy have direct positive impacts on the〓innovation input ability and the innovation industrialization realization ability; tax policy and talent policy have a direct positive impact on the three stages of enterprise innovation ability. Different policies have different impacts on the path of innovation industrialization, which indicates that different policies should have different top-level designs.
Secondly,the innovation input ability does not directly affect the innovation industrialization realization ability in the influence path of six kinds of science and technology innovation policies on enterprise innovation, It affects the innovation intermediate transformation ability, and ultimately affects innovation industrialization realization ability through innovation intermediate transformation ability. Therefore, policy setting should focus not only to increase the basic input of innovation, such as human resources and capital, but also to pay attention to the level increase on the whole chain of innovation input, innovation intermediate transformation and innovation output.
Thirdly,the effectiveness of six kinds of science and technology innovation policies influence on the ability of innovation industrialization are heterogeneous. Talent policy is the most effective relative to other policies for the industrialization of enterprise innovation achievements. The effectiveness of other policies is ranked as follows: tax policy, intellectual property policy, financial policy, fiscal policy and external normative policy. Talent policy which has a significant impact on the ability of innovation industrialization shows that the key to innovation is talents. Science and technology innovation policy should keep up with the national strategic needs and the world’s scientific and technological frontier, introduce and cultivate a group of technological innovation leader to lead the team to achieve the goal of innovation.
Fourthly, the effects of six kinds of science and technology innovation policies on the three stages of enterprise innovation industrialization are different. The input stage of innovation is the most effective, followed by the intermediate transformation stage of innovation, and finally the realization stage of innovation industrialization. This may due to the poor transmission mechanism of the policy. Accordingly, the government not only needs to provide policy support in macro-planning, but also needs more specific, more grounded and receptive policies. Moreover, this strong policy support must run through the whole process of transformation of industrial innovation achievements to ensure the sustained efforts and long-term success. This will also maintain a policy of coherence, determination and orientation.
At last but not at least, this paper puts some recommendations to build a comprehensive, systematic and precise policy system for scientific and technological innovation.On the one hand, the top-level design of science and technology innovation policy urgently needs to pay more attention to the industrialization of science and technology innovation achievements. It can increase investment and support in the intermediate transformation stage of innovation, such as encouraging enterprises to apply for patents, accelerate the pace of R&D and so on. In addition, the policies can focus on the demand side of commodity application and the application of technology in the stage of the realization of innovation industrialization. Such as building a public platform to collect market demand, connect enterprise R&D and market demand docking, and realize the transformation of scientific and technological innovation achievements. On the other hand, science and technology innovation in policy making should pay attention to the path differences of different policies, and make efforts to the weak links of the impact of science and technology innovation policy path. For talents, taxation and intellectual property policies with relatively better policy effectiveness, more attention should be paid to the guidance of policy formulation; for the slightly weaker effective policies like fiscal procurement, external normative policies and financial policies, more attention should be paid to the measures, implementation methods and effectiveness of policies.

Key words: S&T innovation, PLS path model, policy effect, comparative analysis, radar chart