›› 2016, Vol. 28 ›› Issue (6): 86-99.

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Analysis of Fit between Product Innovation Orientation and Supplier Network Configuration and Its Impact on Product Innovation Performance

Wang Wei, Li Suicheng, Yu Wengang, Li Na   

  1. School of Economics and Management, Xi'an University of Technology, Xi'an 710054
  • Received:2014-06-20 Online:2016-06-28 Published:2016-07-07

Abstract:

Increasingly, enterprises pay more attention to the product innovation and how to establish the supplier network is a major task for researchers. By studying Chinese manufacturers, this paper analyzes the differences of supplier network configuration under different product innovation orientation and proposes that manufacturer's product innovation orientation should match supplier network configuration. Subsequently, this paper focuses on the possible impact of the interaction between product innovation orientation and supplier network configuration set on product innovation performance. Product innovation orientations are classified into "open" vs. "closed" and supplier network configurations are differentiated as "exploratory" vs. "exploitative". This paper collects data by large-sample survey, and statistically tests the data from 210 Chinese manufacturers with analysis of variance by SPSS and AMOS. An empirical analysis is conducted to examine the interaction effects between product innovation orientation and supplier network configuration on product innovation performance. The results indicate that, compared with closed supplier network, designing and managing the open supplier network will attain higher product innovation performance for enterprises under exploratory product innovation orientation. Compared with open supplier network, designing and managing the closed supplier network will attain higher product innovation performance for enterprises under exploitative product innovation orientation. The conclusions provide some useful implications about how to manage supplier network effectively to acquire knowledge from suppliers in enterprise's product innovation.

Key words: product innovation orientation, supplier network configuration, product innovation performance, knowledge sharing, fit