Digital Optimization, Green R&D Collaboration, and Green Technological Innovation in Manufacturing Enterprises

Changchun Li and Sen Wang ()
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Changchun Li: Business School, University of International Business and Economics, Beijing 100029, China
Sen Wang: School of Management, Beijing Union University, Beijing 100101, China

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 19, 1-20

Abstract: Manufacturing enterprises are confronted with the historic opportunity and challenge of balancing green transformation with economic development to achieve the goal of carbon neutrality. Some advanced companies are increasingly pursuing green development and innovation by expanding and optimizing the use of digital technology. In this study, we employ Chinese listed manufacturing companies from 2013–2019 as the research sample and examine the mechanism by which corporate digital optimization affects green technological innovation, as well as the mediating role of green R&D collaboration between the two. We also introduce external environmental orientation as a moderating variable. The results of fixed-effect Poisson model analysis are as follows. First, a positive correlation between digital optimization and green R&D collaboration indicates that scaling up digital optimization promotes green R&D collaboration. Second, we observe an inverted U-shaped relationship between green R&D collaboration and green technological innovation. Third, green R&D collaboration acts as a mediating factor between digital optimization and green technological innovation, and external environmental orientation moderates the relationship between digital optimization and green R&D collaboration. Fourth, the threshold effect results indicate that the optimal value of digital optimization projects is 10.167, with too many or too few projects impairing the effect of digital optimization on green technological innovation. All of the above results passed the robustness test.

Keywords: data optimization; external environmental orientation; green R& D collaboration; green technological innovation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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