Emerging innovation networks and changing strategies for industrial technology in China: Some observations

Technology in Society

Volumn 19, Issue 3-4, 1997, Pages 305-323

  Suttmeier, Richard P ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

INDUSTRIAL INNOVATION; INDUSTRIAL POLICY; INNOVATION NETWORK; RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT;

CHINA;

EID: 0031404003     PISSN: 0160791X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/s0160-791x(97)00018-3     Document Type: Article

References (32)

1. An English version of the Decision can be found in Foreign Broadcast Information Service. Daily Report (FBIS-CHI-95-109), 1995, (June 7), 20-31.
2. For recent accounts of the increasingly commercial culture of China's research community, see the reports on Chinese science and technology which appeared in Science, 1995, 270(November 17), 1131-1154, and in Nature, 1995, 378(December 7), 537-552.
3. For recent accounts of the increasingly commercial culture of China's research community, see the reports on Chinese science and technology which appeared in Science, 1995, 270(November 17), 1131-1154, and in Nature, 1995, 378(December 7), 537-552.
4. Xinhua, October 15, 1996. FBIS-CHI-96-203 in World News Connection (http://wnc.fedworld.gov), October 21, 1996.
5. It should be noted that China did not use the concepts of GERD and GNP at the time. For estimates of expenditures in the 1970s, see Gu Shulin, A Review of Reform Policy for the S&T System in China: From Paid Transactions for Technology to Organizational Restructuring. UNU/INTECH Working Paper No. 17. Maastricht: Institute for New Technologies, January, 1995, pp.49-50.
6. China Daily, December 16, 1995. Cited (electronically) in China News Digest, January 1, 1996.
7. China Daily, December 16, 1995. Cited (electronically) in China News Digest, January 1, 1996.
8. Decision, op. cit., p.21.
9. Decision, op. cit., p.21.
10. Xinhua. October 3, 1996. FBIS-CHI-96-195 in World News Connection. (http://wnc.fedworld.gov). October 8, 1996.
11. Again, regional variation is important in thinking about industrial structure. In eastern China, SOEs now account for only 27% of industrial output, with TVEs making up 45% and foreign-invested firms contributing about 20%. In central and western China, however, the SOEs-many of which are losing money-account for almost 47% of industrial production, with the shares for TVEs and JVs being 37% and 4% respectively. China Daily February 19, 1997, p.5.
12. See, Jefferson, G.H., Rawski, T.G. and Zheng, Y., Institutional change and industrial innovation in transitional economies. Journal of Asian Economics, 1994, 5(4), 585-604. Jefferson, Rawski and Zheng attempt to incorporate international product cycle logic into their analysis of the technological dynamics of different types of Chinese enterprises by postulating a hierarchy of firms based upon technological capabilities and costs of production. They see product and process innovations passing down "production/innovation ladders" from WOFEs to JVs to SOEs to TVEs, and pressures for cost-reducing efficiencies and institutional reform passing up the ladder from the TVEs. Their model is suggestive for understanding some of the dynamics of industrial technology change brought about by diverse enterprise types, such as competition between SOEs and TVEs, or the effects of a foreign business presence on SOEs, but may be somewhat insensitive to the variety of innovation networks discussed here.
13. There are some 104,700 state-owned enterprises out of over 9 million Chinese industrial enterprises (most of which are private), the majority of which are controlled by provincial or sub-provincial level governments. Some 14,000 of the SOEs are classified as "large and medium sized" enterprises and form the core of the state industrial sector, accounting for about 80% of total SOE output and 35% of the total industrial output. Of these, 2000-3000 are considered to be "very large". Unless otherwise noted, this background discussion of the SOEs is drawn from Broadman, H.G., Meeting the challenges of Chinese enterprise reform. World Bank Discussion Paper 283. The World Bank, Washington, 1995.
14. The Science and Technology Commission of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. The problems and proposals concerning technological progress in large and medium-sized stateowned enterprises. Forum on Science and Technology in China, 1994, 1(1), 45.
15. The profitability of SOEs is often an illusory concept, depending on the relative prices of inputs and outputs, many of which are still controlled by the state. See, for instance, Png, I. and Wu, C., A tale of two companies. Far Eastern Economic Review, 1995, (October 12), 39.
16. Broadman, op. cit., pp.11-15.
17. X. Zhaoxiang et al., Policy and institutional priorities for industrial technology development: China. Forum on Science and Technology in China, 1995, 2(1), 83.
18. For an insightful treatment of the complex issues of technology and industrial strategy involved in these reorganizations in one industry, see Marukawa, T., Industrial groups and division of labor in China's automobile industry. The Developing Economies, 1995, XXXIII(3), 330-355.
19. Boardman, op. cit., p.26.
20. World Bank loan points way to economic survival. South China Morning Post, China Business Review, 1995, (December 14), 4.
21. Reportedly, Chinese enterprises have spent, on average, only 9 cents on assimilation for every dollar spent on foreign technology. This is in contrast to Korea and Japan where the amounts spent on assimilation were greater than those spent on the technology itself. See, The Science and Technology Commission of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, p.48.
22. Two other successful CIMS systems have also recently received public attention. One of these, at the Beijing Number 1 Machine Tool Plant, recently won the Industry Lead Award from the U.S. Society of Manufacturing Engineers. It also was developed by a team of researchers from different institutions (but coordinated by Tsinghua University) who were supported by the "863" program mentioned in Song Jian's chapter. The other system has been installed at the Chengdu Aircraft Industry Company. Plant wins prize for computer applications. China Daily, 1995, (November 14), 2.
23. The programs will involve projects in the energy, machinery, electronics, transportation, telecommunications, and biotechnology sectors. See China Daily, 1996, (December 27), 5.
24. One is tempted to refer to TVEs and NTEs as part of the "non-state", or perhaps, "collectively owned" sector. While there are TVEs and NTEs which are collectively or privately owned, recent research on TVEs has shown that most are owned by local governments. A large number of NTEs also still belong to government institutes (including CAS) or state-owned universities. What TVEs and NTEs have in common is that they are products of the reform era, hence, the use here of "new enterprise types". See Walder, A.G., Local governments as industrial firms: an organizational analysis of China's transitional economy. American Journal of Sociology, 1995, 101(2), 263-301.
25. Suttmeier, R.P., Laying the corporate foundations for China's high tech future. The China Business Review, 1988, (July-August), 22-25.
26. The most comprehensive account in English of the NTE phenomenon is found in Gu Shulin, Spin-Off Enterprises in China: Channeling the Components of R&D Institutions into Innovative Businesses. UNU/INTECH Working Paper No. 16. Institute for New Technologies, Maastricht, 1994.
27. Gu, Spin-Off Enterprises, op. cit.
28. For an analysis of these functions, see Gu, Spin-Off Enterprises. . . op. cit.
29. This account is based on Tim Turpin, Tong Jian, and Fang Xin. Technology and Innovation Networks in the People's Republic of China. Unpublished paper presented at the International Symposium on Innovation Networks: East Meets West. Sydney, Australia, August 30-31, 1995.
30. Suttmeier, Laying corporate foundations, op. cit., p.23.
31. China Daily, 1996, (October 4), 1.
32. China Daily, 1996, (December 20), 4.