Research on the Influence Mechanism and Configuration Path of Network Relationship Characteristics on SMEs’ Innovation—The Mediating Effect of Supply Chain Dynamic Capability and the Moderating Effect of Geographical Proximity

Hongxiong Yang and Wanru Ren
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Hongxiong Yang: School of Management, Tianjin University of Technology, Tianjin 300384, China
Wanru Ren: School of Management, Tianjin University of Technology, Tianjin 300384, China

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 17, 1-16

Abstract: Innovation is the continuous source of power for the survival and development of SMEs, but the complexity of innovation and the limitation of resources make SMEs trapped in the dilemma of “innovation difficulty”. A moderated mediating model was constructed based on social network theory and resource view, and fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) was used to empirically study the influence mechanism between network relationship characteristics and SMEs’ innovation and the configuration path to achieve SMEs’ high innovation performance. The results show that the characteristics of network relationships positively affect the innovation performance of SMEs. Supply chain dynamic capability plays an intermediary role between network relationships and SMEs’ innovation relationships. Different geographical proximity levels of the supply chain lead to different coordination interaction and knowledge sharing efficiency between upstream and downstream, which not only positively moderates the relationship between supply chain dynamic capability and SMEs’ innovation performance, but also moderates its mediating effect. Furthermore, the fs QCA analysis results show three configurations for SMEs’ high innovation performance based on the characteristics of network relations: geographic proximity regulating type, network relationship dominant type, and dynamic coordination and integration type.

Keywords: network relationship; supply chain dynamic capability; geographical proximity; SMEs innovation; fs QCA (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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