Theme：Who leads the innovation? -- On the influence of actual controller's industry expertise on company innovation

Lecturer: Shuai Shao

Time：2022.06.21 10:00

Site: Tecent meeting 24160976

Abstract:

The actual controllers of Chinese private listed companies generally hold a high level of ownership, participate deeply in corporate governance and decision-making, and as the main provider of company capital, bear the income and risk of innovation. This paper takes private listed companies on the original SME board and GEM Board of Shenzhen Stock Exchange from 2007 to 2020 as samples, discusses the impact of industry expertise of actual controller on corporate innovation and its mechanism from the perspective of combining capital and technology, and compares the roles of actual controller and CEO in corporate decision-making. It is found that the actual controller with industry expertise promotes the innovation of the company through the combination of "capital" and "technology", and has a more important impact on innovation than the CEO. Further, this paper discusses the path of innovation led by actual controllers: practical controllers with industry expertise can reduce the diversification level of enterprises and promote the innovation input of the company through deep cultivation of the main industry; Secondly, the actual controller with industry expertise can better understand the difficulty of R&D and innovation, and reduce the management short-sightedness and career risks. Finally, starting from the subjective motivation, governance power and capital constraints of the actual controller, this paper finds that the higher the degree of direct ownership of the actual controller, the more the actual controller holds the position of CEO and the lower the degree of capital constraint of the company, the stronger the industry expertise of the actual controller will promote the company's innovation. In this paper, the characteristics of actual controllers are incorporated into the research framework, the theory of high-level echelon is expanded, and the companies whose actual controllers have industry expertise are provided with a certain degree of financing support and policy preference, which provides theoretical support and policy suggestions for the implementation of the national innovation-driven development strategy.

Introduction to the lecturer:

Shuai Shao is an associate professor in the Department of Finance and Accounting, School of Management of Zhejiang University. She received her PhD from Fudan University and was jointly trained by Fudan University and Yale University. She also received her undergraduate degree from Zhejiang University. Her research interests include Accounting and capital markets, financial information disclosure and ownership structure. Her research results have been published in the top international journal Review of Accounting Studies and the authoritative Chinese journal Management World and Accounting Research. She presided over a National Natural Science Foundation Youth Fund and a major key project of the Ministry of Education sub-project. She has undertaken the teaching of many undergraduate and postgraduate courses, and is good at the theory and case teaching of financial accounting courses. She won the first prize of Zhejiang University Young Teacher Teaching Competition in 2019 and the second prize of Zhejiang Young Teacher Teaching Competition in 2021.