轉(zhuǎn)型經(jīng)濟(jì)中的研發(fā)和企業(yè)績效[文獻(xiàn)翻譯]

1、原文:R&D and Firm Performance in a Transition EconomyINTRODUCTIONAccording to international comparative statistics the Eastern European countries show much less innovative activity than e.g. the EU average This might be good or bad. If the firms are not capable enough to handle R&D processes it is goo

2、d that they recognize this. During a country s transformation process to a market economy, adoption of established processes and products in connection with product variation and competitive production possibilities are an attractive alternative to innovation. However most observers ask for more R&D

3、in these countries and for policies easing innovation in order to increase growth.Those policy interventions are not only subject of theoretical discussions. Subsidies granted by the European Commission in member countries, like the sixth framework program, are also relevant for the accession countr

4、ies of the European Union. Perhaps R&D subsidies are partly wasted if granted in an early stage of the transformation process and could be used in a more productive way. It might be the case that instead of conducting research and development firms in these areas are better off by the production of

5、established products at lower costs than in the Western countries. Answers to these questions would surely be helpful for the policy design for transformation processes.The purpose of our article is to compare the success of innovative activity in Eastern and Western Germany in order to investigate

6、whether there are differences with respect to R&D performance between the two parts of reunified Germany. Eastern Germanyis a very special example of a transition economy. The movement from the former German Democratic Republic to states of the GermanFederal Republic was accompanied by the introduct

7、ion of a well established currency, a stable and reliable legalframework and a highly developed system of industrial relations. Althoughdifferences between both parts of the reunified Germany arose in themean time, these are certainly smaller than those with respect to other transition economics. He

8、nce this is the unparalleled opportunity to compare an established market economy with a transition economy on the basis of very similar environmental conditions. Hence, the ceteris paribus condition applies.R&Dconducted by East-German firms is heavily subsidized as the policy decision makers regard

9、 it as being very important that the competitiveness of these companies is improved by technological leadership. It remains to be shown that these subsidies are not wasted. Weintend to answer this question by comparing the performance of Eastern and Western German enterprises. Innovation in a transi

10、tion economy like Eastern Germany might suffer from lacking experience with both the current technological frontier and mechanism sat place in a market economy. For example, outdated human capitalmay often lead to duplicateresearch (byaccident),or firms could rely only on imitation (on purpose).In c

11、ombination with high demand uncertainty and lackingexperience inmarketing strategy, investments in R&Dmaynot lead to (expected) returns. Reasonable returns could be necessary to survive for startup firms, though.The purpose of this paper has two dimensions: On one hand, we compare Western and Easter

12、n Germanmanufacturing firms by relating a credit rating index as measure of performance to R&D spending and other firm characteristics.Onthe other hand, weextend the rating model by a secondequation dealingwith financialdistress and bankruptcy. This isparticularly interesting because Eastern German

13、manufacturing is predominantly composed of small and medium-sized enterprises that were newly founded after the Germanreunification in 1990.We ask the question whether investment in R&Dis valued as in Western Germany, or if agencies rate such firms more conservative, because young firms lack a corre

14、sponding track record on which the rating could be based. This study could be highly relevant for innovation policy. Eastern German firms receive relatively more subsidies than their Western Germancounterparts. The German government intends to foster the transformation process from a planned economy

15、 to a viable market economy by among other policies, an intensive support for innovative activities in order to strengthen the competitiveness of the Eastern German regions. If, however, innovation activities in the East do not lead to successful products and market success, but fail or, in the wors

16、t case, put firms at the risk of bankruptcy, this policy strategy may be an inefficient allocation of resources.Our study is an extension of the (few) existing studies on the effects of innovations in transition economies. Aghi on et al. (2002) as well as Carlin et al.(2004) investigate the effect o

17、f innovations on growth of a sample of 2,245 respectively 3,288 firms from 24 Eastern European countries and they find that some competitive pressure is good for innovativeness, but too much can be counterproductive (Carlin et al. 2004).Innovativeness has a positive impact on growth. However, it is

18、not tested whether innovations have also a positive effect on profitability. Konings and Xavier (2002) utilize information concerning innovation and use the ratio of intangible assets to total fixed assets as an exogenous variable explaining survival and growth for a sample of 2,813 Slovenian firms

19、over the time period from 1994 to 1998.It turns out that the innovation variable has negative, yet in significant, coefficients both in the growth and the survival equations. However, this is a first indication that innovation might not support growth and survivalof firmsin a transition economy. Thi

20、s stands in contrast to the empirical results estimated for firms in non-transition countries (see e.g. Hall 1987,Cefis and Marsili 2006).We are not aware of a study that directly compares non-transition and transition countries.CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORKFirm performance with respect to R&D has been measu

21、red by a variety of indicators such as productivity, profitability, and firm s stockmarket valuations .In this paper we employ a broad measure encompassing productivity, profitability and stock market value. We approximate the overall firm value by firms credit ratings. The firm value is expected to

22、 reflect the value of both tangible assets and intangible assets, in particular knowledge capital, the intangible assets created by R&D activity. It accounts for business and financial risks, such as industry characteristics, competitive position, management, productivity, profitability, liquidity a

23、s well as financial policy and flexibility.Thus it reflects both currently observable firm characteristics and expectations regarding future developments.The statement that innovative activity is a risky undertaking is close to triviality. Risk is expected to affect firm value negatively, as the pro

24、bability of a bankruptcy or at least payment delays will increase.However, due to the fact that innovation is a driving force for economic success, a trade-off between risk and future success exists. There might well be an internal optimum which meansthat some R&Dis useful, whilst too much R&D does

25、not maximize the present firm value. Thus a moderately successfully R&Dperforming firm is expected to have high revenues and a good financial performance. In the long run an innovative firm may have better chances to survive, if investments into these activities are not too large.Aside of the genera

26、l relevance of evaluating the effect of R&D activity on firm value, it is of specific interest in the case of Eastern Germany. Weare able to compare the market economyof Western Germanywith an economyin transition where both have the samecurrency unit, the same legal system, the same economic system

27、 and all other important contributions to the business environment. It should be noted, though, that in Eastern Germany a much smaller share of all workers is covered by collective bargaining agreements and that more than 15 years after the unification, wages are still lower in Eastern Germany, on a

28、verage. However, this should improve the competitiveness of the affected companies.After the German reunification in 1990, the East German industrial sector more or less collapsed. The existing larger firms were sold to new owners and a restructuring process took place. Among introductions of other

29、policy measures, R&Dhas been heavily subsidized in order to speed up the convergence process. Fostering innovation is clearly intended to improve the competitiveness of the companies in question and this was highly needed for the former producers in a centrally governed planning society. In order to

30、 be a successful stimulus to the catching-up process, the subsidies must be used efficiently within the firm.As said above we use credit ratings as the variable reflecting economic performance of a firm. In a second step of our analysis we investigate whether the results we find with respect to the

31、rating are also reflected in other performance indicators. Since Eastern German firms are, on average, muchyounger and smaller than Western Germanfirms, they face higher market uncertainty. This could result in more conservative ratings simply due to lacking track records and experience with such bu

32、sinesses. In order to assess a potential downward bias for non-economically motivated reasons by the rating agency, we verify our finding on the credit rating by an estimation of a second equation. As an alternative to the rating, we consider financial distress. Although we observe actual bankcruptc

33、y, too, we prefer to use a broader measure of financial distress, because firm bankruptcies are rare events, and theFinancial distress iseconometric analysis of such is difficult.described by the payment behavior of firms.A default is certainly an incidence that a lender definitely wants to avoid, b

34、ut late payments are also a problem and usually related to financial losses and, in addition, it may be awarning that more serious problems could arise in the near future. Therefore, we believe that payment behavior is an objective measure concerning the risk of borrowers or other remittees, and tha

35、t it directly translates into liquidity of firms.In summary, we argue that R&Din Eastern Germanyis perceived as more risky rather than beneficial for firm value. In the West, the opposite is true. However, the regressions on future financial distress measured by the payment behavior (time elapsing u

36、ntil payment of bills) indicate that Eastern Germanfirms are not discriminated by the rating agency. R&D does indeed lead to liquidity problems in the future rather than to improved successful products or cost reductions in production. These results call into question the high subsidization of Easte

37、rn Germanfirms. If the resources are inefficiently used, policy makers could think about alternative ways to improve the competitiveness of the Eastern German business sector.CONCLUSIONThis paper reports the results of an empirical study concerning the effects of innovative activity on credit rating

38、s of firms. The credit rating approach is extended by an objective variable concerning the financial status of firms. Weuse the time taken until payment obligations are fuelled. it turns out that the Eastern German firms are very dissimilar to the Western Germanones. They perform worse. Any R&Deffor

39、t leads to a lower credit rating, hence the rating agency distrusts thesefirms. An examination of the payment behavior (as an indicator for financial distress) shows that the rating agency does not discriminate Eastern German firms with respect to ratings. Innovative activity increases future financ

40、ial distress in Eastern Germany. The firms invest in R&D without getting corresponding returns afterwards. It remains a demanding task for future work to explain why this phenomenon occurs in Eastern Germany. If R&D is subsidized, we find that it contributes positively to performance in the West, bu

41、t not in Eastern German firms.However, in the case of subsidy receipt, R&D does at least not harm the economic performance in the East.This research would disent agle R&D into original research and research mainly aiming at imitation of existing products in established markets. On the one hand, East

42、ern German firms could mainly focus on imitation which would possibly explain the less successful outcome of R&D in such firms. On the other hand, they may well come up with market novelties, but those mayeither lack sufficient demandor do not achieve the quality necessary to succeed in (internation

43、al) markets.Source: Dirk Czarnitzki. Kornelius Kraft, 2006. “ R&D and Firm Performance in a TransitionEconomy”.KYKLOS news.vol.59,no.4,april,pp.481-496.譯文:轉(zhuǎn)型經(jīng)濟(jì)中的研發(fā)和企業(yè)績效簡介根據(jù)國際比較統(tǒng)計(jì)東歐國家表現(xiàn)出很大的不足，例如創(chuàng)新活動(dòng)。歐盟的平均 水平，這在這方面可能是好也或是壞的。如果公司沒有足夠能力來處理的R& D過程是好的，他們認(rèn)識(shí)到這一點(diǎn)。在一個(gè)國家向市場經(jīng)濟(jì)轉(zhuǎn)型的過程中， 產(chǎn)品的 變化和競爭力的生產(chǎn)可能性連接產(chǎn)品的采用是一個(gè)有

44、吸引力的替代品創(chuàng)新，但大多數(shù)觀察家要求在這些國家和政策的放寬創(chuàng)新更多的研發(fā)，以增加經(jīng)濟(jì)的增長。這些政策措施不僅是理論討論的主題。還是獲歐洲委員會(huì)成員國，如第六框 架計(jì)劃的補(bǔ)貼，有關(guān)的歐洲聯(lián)盟也加入進(jìn)來了。 也許研發(fā)補(bǔ)貼部分是浪費(fèi)的，但 是給予一個(gè)轉(zhuǎn)型的早期階段，可以更高效地利用。它可能是這樣，而不是在這些 領(lǐng)域進(jìn)行研究和開發(fā)。公司總體上達(dá)到小康較低的費(fèi)用由既定的產(chǎn)品的生產(chǎn)能力 所決定?；卮疬@些問題，一定會(huì)為在轉(zhuǎn)化過程中的政策設(shè)計(jì)提供幫助。文章的目的是比較德國東部和西部，以創(chuàng)新活動(dòng)成功，調(diào)查是否有與研發(fā)方面的兩部分之間的表現(xiàn)差異。德國東部是一個(gè)非常特殊的轉(zhuǎn)軌經(jīng)濟(jì)的例子。 從原 德意志民主共和國運(yùn)

45、動(dòng)對(duì)德意志聯(lián)邦共和國的國家是伴隨著一個(gè)完善的貨幣，一個(gè)穩(wěn)定和可靠的法律框架和高度發(fā)達(dá)的工業(yè)關(guān)系制度。雖然統(tǒng)一后的德國之間的 差異使得兩個(gè)部分的產(chǎn)生，但是這些方面肯定比其他轉(zhuǎn)軌經(jīng)濟(jì)學(xué)概率小。因此， 比較與過渡經(jīng)濟(jì)對(duì)非常相似的環(huán)境條件的基礎(chǔ)上建立的市場經(jīng)濟(jì)，這是無與倫比的機(jī)會(huì)。因此，在其他條件不變的情況下也是適用的。德國企業(yè)進(jìn)行大量補(bǔ)貼研發(fā)項(xiàng)目的政策，決策者認(rèn)為是非常重要的，因?yàn)檫@ 些公司的競爭力是由技術(shù)領(lǐng)先地位所提高的。 雖然有待證明?；卮鸨容^德國東部 企業(yè)的業(yè)績這個(gè)問題。在轉(zhuǎn)軌經(jīng)濟(jì)創(chuàng)新時(shí)可能遭受缺乏目前的技術(shù)限制。 如地方 的經(jīng)驗(yàn)過時(shí)，常常導(dǎo)致重復(fù)研究，或公司只依靠模仿。在高需求的不確定性和缺

46、 乏經(jīng)驗(yàn)策略組合下，投資印度盧比不會(huì)導(dǎo)致預(yù)計(jì)的回報(bào)。 合理回報(bào)可能為企業(yè)的 生存提供了一線生機(jī)。本文的目的有兩個(gè)方面：一方面，我們比較西方和有關(guān)作為衡量性能的標(biāo)準(zhǔn) 的R& D支出和其他企業(yè)特征的信用評(píng)級(jí)指標(biāo)東德制造公司。另一方面，我們擴(kuò)大了第二次與金融危機(jī)和破產(chǎn)處理方程的評(píng)級(jí)模型。特別有趣的是，因?yàn)榈聡鴸|部制造業(yè)主要是小型和中型的企業(yè)新生力，在1990年德國的統(tǒng)一要求企業(yè)組成的投資相對(duì)于印度盧比來說是有價(jià)值的?；蛘呷绻髽I(yè)的生產(chǎn)模式比較保守， 而新生的企業(yè)缺乏經(jīng)驗(yàn)，難以跟蹤記錄，就更難以評(píng)比，這也就為此打下了研究 基礎(chǔ)。這項(xiàng)研究是與高度創(chuàng)新的政策有關(guān)。 德國東部企業(yè)獲得比更多的德國西部所 沒有

47、獲得的補(bǔ)貼。德國政府也打算推動(dòng)改革，使其計(jì)劃經(jīng)濟(jì)向市場經(jīng)濟(jì)轉(zhuǎn)變，正 因?yàn)檎叩闹С郑矠閯?chuàng)新活動(dòng)密集的行動(dòng)打下了基礎(chǔ)， 以加強(qiáng)對(duì)德國東部地區(qū) 的支援。但是，在德國東部的創(chuàng)新活動(dòng)不一定會(huì)推廣的市場上的情況下，也就不一定會(huì)成功。倘若失敗，或者考慮最壞的打算，擺在企業(yè)面前的是企業(yè)面臨的破 產(chǎn)危機(jī)，而這一政策可能產(chǎn)生的效果就是資源的最低利用。我們的研究是關(guān)于經(jīng)濟(jì)轉(zhuǎn)型創(chuàng)新的影響。根據(jù)現(xiàn)有的資料所延伸。在研究的 經(jīng)濟(jì)轉(zhuǎn)型創(chuàng)新上分別有來自24個(gè)東歐國家2,2453,288公司的樣本來研究其影 響，他們發(fā)現(xiàn)，存在一些競爭壓力是有好處的。但是過多的可能會(huì)適得其反。創(chuàng) 新對(duì)經(jīng)濟(jì)增長是有積極的影響的。 但是，它沒有

48、預(yù)測是否也有創(chuàng)新，對(duì)盈利能力 產(chǎn)生積極的影響。一些人利用信息相關(guān)的創(chuàng)新和利用無形資產(chǎn)總額的比率作為別 的來解釋有關(guān)公司所提供的數(shù)據(jù)所在的生存條件和發(fā)展的變量的固定資產(chǎn)。事實(shí)證明，創(chuàng)新變量都在變化，相應(yīng)的系數(shù)表明創(chuàng)新可能不支持在一個(gè)過渡經(jīng)濟(jì)增長 和企業(yè)的生存價(jià)值。以在非過渡國家的公司的估計(jì)研究為代表， 我們可以得到對(duì) 非過的和轉(zhuǎn)型的國家的一個(gè)認(rèn)識(shí)與看法。概念框架公司方面的R& D績效測量，如生產(chǎn)力指標(biāo)，盈利品種和公司股票的市場估 佰。在本文中，我們采用了廣泛的措施，包括生產(chǎn)率，盈利能力和股市。由公司 的信用評(píng)級(jí)公司的價(jià)值。公司的價(jià)值預(yù)期，以反映包括有形資產(chǎn)和無形資產(chǎn)的價(jià) 值，特別是知識(shí)資本。它占為商業(yè)和金融風(fēng)險(xiǎn)，如行業(yè)特點(diǎn)，競爭地位，管理， 生產(chǎn)效率，盈利能力，流動(dòng)性以及財(cái)政政策，這既反映了目前的經(jīng)濟(jì)發(fā)展趨勢也 觀察了企業(yè)特征和未來發(fā)展的期望。創(chuàng)新活動(dòng)是一個(gè)冒險(xiǎn)的行動(dòng)，要有預(yù)見性的思想的，否則就會(huì)使得一個(gè)企業(yè)有破產(chǎn)的可能，或有拖欠付款的可能，使得信用度降低。然而，由于這一個(gè)事實(shí)， 即創(chuàng)新是經(jīng)濟(jì)成功的驅(qū)動(dòng)力，貿(mào)易和未來的成功與風(fēng)險(xiǎn)之間的影響力所帶來的企 業(yè)效益，增加公司的價(jià)