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| How Does Alliance Stability Affect Exploratory Innovation in Dynamic Environment?A Study on the Mechanisms Based on Dynamic and Relational View |
| Zhang Jie,Zhang Chenlu,Liu Xiaoning |
| (School of Economics and Management, Northwest University, Xi′an 710127,China) |
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Abstract Exploratory innovation is an important driving force for enterprises to promote leapfrog development, form a second growth curve, and respond to the dynamic environment.Exploratory innovation benefits from the complementarity of technology, market, and design capabilities from different sources and requires the inflow and coupling of external knowledge. Alliance partners are an important search channel as well as an important mode of open innovation. A stable alliance can improve the level of knowledge-sharing among organizations. From the relational view, specific relational assets, knowledge sharing paths and effective governance mechanisms are the sources of enterprise value creation. Due to the repeated transactions between stable alliances, specific relational assets and interdependent complementary resources are formed. It is necessary to explore how to choose an effective governance mechanism to promote inter-alliance knowledge-sharing activities and further facilitate exploratory innovation activities, and how to choose a governance mechanism for a stable alliance to adapt to a dynamic environment. This study integrates the mediating mechanism of partner knowledge sharing with the moderating mechanism of two governance approaches to analyze how stable alliances influence exploratory innovation activities in the dynamic environment.#br#This study collects and analyzes data through questionnaires from companies in Guangdong, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Shandong, Shaanxi, Henan, and so on. It uses 490 valid questionnaires and the optimal scale regression method to verify the relationship between alliance stability, exploratory innovation, partner knowledge-sharing, governance mechanisms, and environmental dynamics. The results show that partner knowledge-sharing behavior plays a mediating role between alliance stability and exploratory innovation. The effectiveness of the stability alliance in exploring innovation depends on the inbound open innovation process of knowledge flow from outside to inside. Relational governance and contractual governance play different moderating roles in alliance stability, partner knowledge-sharing and exploratory innovation, respectively. The relational governance mechanism has a more positive moderating effect on alliance stability and partner knowledge sharing, while the contractual governance mechanism has a more positive moderating effect on alliance stability and exploratory innovation, thus, a dual governance mechanism needs to be constructed. Furthermore, the three-way interactions of environmental dynamics, alliance stability, and alliance governance have different effects on partner knowledge sharing and exploratory innovation, respectively, and the dual alliance governance effectiveness diminishes at different stages as environmental dynamics increases. However, the mediating effect of partner knowledge sharing in the relationship between three-way interactions and exploratory innovation is not verified. The mediating mechanism of partner knowledge sharing is also declining. The study explores the contexts in which alliance stability is effective, and provides a theoretical basis for firms to carry out alliance construction and governance dynamically to promote exploratory innovation.#br#The effective governance mechanism to promote inter-alliance knowledge-sharing activities is revealed, and contractual governance should be superimposed based on relational governance to break constraints and relational inertia with institutions to stimulate partner knowledge-sharing in stable alliances while promoting exploratory innovation activities more effectively. Further, as environmental dynamics is high, the effectiveness of dual alliance governance is weakened at different action stages. The study finds out the different secondary moderating effects of environmental dynamics on alliance stability, partner knowledge sharing and exploratory innovation. By demonstrating the intrinsic logic of decreasing the value of stable inter-alliance relationships in the dynamic environment, it validates and further complements the theory of dynamic relational view.#br#Thus,to better promote exploratory innovation activities, enterprises need to effectively govern long-term stable alliance assets and construct mechanisms to promote practical knowledge sharing among partners. First, the focal enterprises can facilitate knowledge-sharing among partners by constructing adequate multiple-partner knowledge-sharing paths to promote partners′ willingness, ability, and effectiveness to carry out information and knowledge-sharing activities. Second, in the selection of governance mechanism in stable alliance relationships, contractual governance mechanism is preferred over relational governance mechanism. The enterprises can accelerate the formation of new digital assets among alliances through digital technology, form relationship-specific digital assets, apply digital governance technology and establish digital alliances to promote the new value of alliance assets. Third, in the dynamic environment, the exit mechanism in alliance management needs to be further improved in conducting regular alliance governance activities. Alliances can achieve equilibrium with a dynamic and relational view by adjusting internal mechanisms in the dynamic environment.#br#
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Received: 14 July 2022
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