Does Digital Capability Promote Sustainable Development of New Ventures? The Dual Impact of Green Knowledge Creation and Green Pressure

Kai Zhuge, Weiwei Lin, Yongzhi Yuan (), Huitao He () and Yong Zhang
Additional contact information
Kai Zhuge: Business School, Soochow University, Suzhou 215021, China
Weiwei Lin: Business School, Soochow University, Suzhou 215021, China
Yongzhi Yuan: School of Political and Public Administration, Soochow University, Suzhou 215021, China
Huitao He: Business School, Soochow University, Suzhou 215021, China
Yong Zhang: Institute of Quality Economics, China Jiliang University, Hangzhou 310018, China

IJERPH, 2023, vol. 20, issue 3, 1-18

Abstract: With the environmental problems brought about by the extensive economic development model attracting more and more global attention, sustainable development has become a hot topic in transformation and development of contemporary enterprises. In the context of the digital economy, there is a lack of conclusive evidence regarding whether and how enterprises rely on digital capabilities to improve green efficiency and achieve sustainable development, especially for new ventures. Therefore, based on the knowledge creation spiral theory, this paper examines the relationship between digital capabilities, green knowledge creation, and sustainable development of new ventures. The study tested its hypotheses on a sample of 316 Chinese new ventures. The results showed that digital capabilities can positively affect environmental, economic, and social performance of new ventures and support their sustainable development; green knowledge creation plays a mediating role in the relationship between digital capabilities and sustainable development, and green pressure positively moderates the relationship between green knowledge creation and sustainable development; furthermore, green pressure also moderates the process of digital capabilities influencing sustainable development through green knowledge creation, and that moderated mediation role is significant. According to the bootstrap mediating effect test, both the direct effect and indirect effect are significant. Overall, our research results provide important insights for new ventures to promote sustainable development through digitalization. Therefore, managers should pay more attention to digital construction in the strategic layout of new ventures, and they should advocate the concept of green knowledge so that the goal of sustainable development can be achieved with the drive for digitalization.

Keywords: digital capability; green knowledge creation; green pressure; sustainable development; new ventures (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/3/2274/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/3/2274/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:3:p:2274-:d:1048295

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().