JPM on China

@article{murmann_zhi,

title = {What Enables a Chinese Firm to Create New-to-the-World Innovations? A Historical Case Study of Intrafirm Coopetition in the Instant Messaging Service Sector},

author = {Johann Peter Murmann and Zhijing Zhu},

doi = {10.1287/stsc.2021.0142},

year  = {2021},

date = {2021-01-01},

urldate = {2021-01-01},

journal = {Strategy Science},

volume = {6},

number = {4},

pages = {265-445},

abstract = {Chinese firms have been widely seen as imitative. This historical case study explores what organizational mechanisms allowed Tencent, a Chinese firm in the fast-changing instant messaging (IM) service sector, to achieve a new-to-the-world innovation with its WeChat smartphone app. Tracing the competitive dynamics in the Chinese IM sector from its inception, we found that Tencent was able to create the innovative WeChat product through a crisis-induced intrafirm coopetition dynamic that was embedded in variation-selection-retention evolutionary processes spanning the market, the firm, and the business unit levels. Building on the intrafirm coopetition and evolutionary literatures, the paper shows that three business units simultaneously competed and cooperated in developing alternative IM products while being exposed to market selection for survival. The coopetition dynamic took place in three key areas: technology, product promotion, and complementary assets of suppliers. The relative balance between competition and cooperation changed over time, and top management guidance and firm-level routines were essential in managing the challenges of coopetition within the firm.},

keywords = {Coopetition, Evolutionary Theory, Tencent, WeChat},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}

@article{10.1093/icc/dtr070,

title = {Regional institutions, ownership transformation, and migration of industrial leadership in China: the case of the Chinese synthetic dye industry, 1978–2008},

author = {Hong Jiang and Johann Peter Murmann},

url = {https://doi.org/10.1093/icc/dtr070},

doi = {10.1093/icc/dtr070},

issn = {0960-6491},

year  = {2011},

date = {2011-01-01},

urldate = {2011-01-01},

journal = {Industrial and Corporate Change},

volume = {21},

number = {4},

pages = {933-970},

abstract = {Scholars have emphasized the gradual ownership transformation of enterprises as a key driver of the Chinese economy's unprecedented growth. However, little work has been done on the issue of whether this transformation process takes place evenly across the various regions in China. This article describes the important role of regional institutions in shaping the ownership-based competitiveness of local enterprises and the migration of industries across regions. In the case of the Chinese synthetic dye industry, the passing of leadership from state-owned enterprises (SOEs) to collectively owned enterprises (COEs) and then to private enterprises (PEs) was accompanied by a concurrent leadership migration from one region to another. The article contends that this simultaneous occurrence was not accidental. Four institutional constraints—the degree of central supervision, the local labor arrangements, the local social welfare provision, and the degree of ambiguity in property rights—retarded the rise of new ownership forms in the previously dominant regions. This gave other regions the opening to take over leadership positions by providing a more favorable institutional context for new ownership forms. These findings are likely to apply to all of the Chinese manufacturing industries that existed prior to 1978 and that subsequently did not experience significant technological changes and were not highly protected by the government.},

keywords = {COEs, Corporate Forms, Dye Industry, Evolutionary Theory, Private Enterprise, Regional Advantage, SOEs},

pubstate = {published},

tppubtype = {article}

}