Developing Joint R&D Institutes between Chinese Universities and International Enterprises in China’s Innovation System: A Case at Tsinghua University

Abstract

This paper examines the role of joint R&D institutes co-established by Chinese research universities and international enterprises. Guided by an analytical framework of institutional logics in the evolution of the Triple Helix model, this study aims to explore the institutionalization process of a joint R&D institute in the contexts of global and Chinese innovation systems; further, it analyzes which mingling institutional logics, respectively carried by a Chinese research university and an international enterprise, affect the collaboration between both parties moving from informal R&D collaboration toward an institutionalized organization. The case study method enabled the author to understand the complexity of the interlacing of international and national actors with regards to the joint R&D institutes. The contribution of the study to the existing literature is two-fold: on the conceptual front, it advances theoretical understandings of the interactions of institutional logics which result in varied patterns of joint R&D institute in a national context with transnational factors; on the empirical front, it examines the evolutionary path of a joint R&D institute established by a Chinese research university and an international enterprise.Sustainability 2019, 11, 7133 2 of 25 in research, (2) exhibition of organizational formality, and (3) promotion of organizational and cross-sector collaboration and transfer. In this study, the above-mentioned "larger organization" refers to the joint R&D institute's affiliated university. The joint R&D institutes' mandates, operations and activities reflect the interests of both their affiliated universities and their external international sponsors. Moreover, their organizational formalities are more flexible than departmental structures and can be adjusted to increase the universities' adaptations and responsiveness to the demands of the external community [11,12].Since the mid-1990s, when an increasing number of international enterprises started to move better paid and more brain-intensive labor to China, Chinese research universities have become the primary R&D partners for these enterprises [13][14][15], and joint R&D institutes have become one of their most important forms of partnership [16][17][18][19]. As of 2016, international enterprises had established more than 1800 R&D institutes in China [20]. According to statistics from the Ministry of Education of China, the key universities directly under the supervision of the Ministry of Education have close collaborations with more than 1100 enterprises from more than 100 countries around the world [21].What, then, are the attractions of China, and the Chinese research universities, for those international enterprises? Wang et al. [22] perceived R&D cooperation as a kind of transaction. The major incentives for international enterprises are pressure from market competition and cost saving. Universities provide knowledge and cultural products as well as human resources to enterprises, while enterprises can supply universi...

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