Technology licensing and innovation performance: evidence from Chinese latecomers in high-tech industries

As a catalyst for endogenous technological change, inward technology licensing (ITL) can improve a firm's innovation performance. This paper investigates the effect of learning by licensing and choice of licensed-in technologies on innovation performance. We extend the ITL strategy to the latecomer context, addressing two critical factors: (1) number of licenses and (2) age of licensed-in technology. We hypothesize about the relationship of the licensee's innovation performance with the number of licenses and age of licensed-in technology, as well as the moderating effect of the licensee's absorptive capacity. Based on a sample of 154 Chinese high-tech firms, empirical evidence is found in support of our arguments. This study is the first to consider the significance of the age of licensed-in technology to innovation performance and found that the number of licenses has a curvilinear (an inverted U) relationship with innovation performance. We also confirmed the significant moderating effect of absorptive capacity on the above two relationships.