China as an Innovation Nation

Edited by Yu Zhou, William Lazonick, and Yifei Sun

Offers an introduction on theories of innovation and its application to China, outlining the key institution China must build for innovation and strategies in the era of global production system
Provides overview of the evolution of Chinese state policy in innovation, challenge the monolithic, static views of Chinese state and also discuss some major controversial state policies
Includes new information on fast evolving financial landscape on innovation from outside state controlled channels.
Presents data and research on several sectors including mechanical engineering, railroads, information and communication technology, and wind and solar energy

China as an Innovation Nation

Edited by Yu Zhou, William Lazonick, and Yifei Sun

Description

This volume assesses China's transition to innovation-nation status in terms of social conditions, industry characteristics and economic impacts over the past three decades, also providing insights into future developments.

Defining innovation as the process that generates a higher quality, lower cost product than was previously available, the introductory chapter conceptualizes the theory of an innovation nation and the lessons from Japan and Untied States. It outlines the key governance, employment and investment institutions that China must build for such transition to occur, and examines China's challenges and strategies to innovate in the era of global production systems. Two succeeding chapters explain the evolving roles of Chinese state in innovation, and the new landscape of venture capital finance. The remaining chapters provide studies of major industries, which contain analyses of the evolving roles of investment by government agencies and business interests in the process. Included in these studies are traditional industries such as mechanical engineering, railroads, and automobiles; rapidly evolving and internationally highly integrated industries such as information-and-communication-technology (ICT); and newly emerging sectors such as wind and solar energy.

Written by leading academics in the field, studies in this volume reveal Chinese innovation as diverse across industries and enterprises and fluid over time. In each sector, we observe continued co-evolution of state policy, market demand, and technology development. The strategies and structures of individual companies and industrial ecosystems are changing rapidly. The sum total of the studies is a great step forward in our understanding of the industrial foundations of China's attempt to become an innovation nation.

China as an Innovation Nation

Edited by Yu Zhou, William Lazonick, and Yifei Sun

1. Introduction: China's Transformation into an Innovation Nation, William Lazonick, Yu Zhou, and Yifei Sun
2. Evolution of Chinese State Policies on Innovation, Yu Zhou and Xielin Liu
3. Venture Capital in China, Jun Zhang
4. China's Mechanical Engineering Industry: Offering the Potential for Indigenous Innovation?, Ingo Liefner and Gang Zeng
5. Chinese Indigenous Innovation in the Car Sector: Being Integrated or Being the Integrator, Kaidong Feng
6. High Speed Rail Development in China - A Case Study of State-guided Technology Transfer, Rongfang (Rachel) Liu, Liu (Willow) Lv and Zhaodong (Tony) Huang
7. State, Market, and Business Enterprise: Development of the Chinese Integrated Circuit Foundries, Yin Li
8. Catching up and Developing Innovation Capabilities in China's Telecommunication Equipment Industry, Peilei Fan and Xudong Gao
9. 9 State, Multinational Corporations, Returnees and Development of China's Integrated Circuit (IC) Design Industry, Yifei Sun, Zi Xue and Debin Du
10. The Evolution of China's Mobile Phone Industry and Good-enough Innovation, Shin-Horng Chen and Pei-Chang Wen
11. The Development of China's Wind Power Technology Sector: Characterizing National Policy Support, Technology Acquisition and Technological Learning, Joanna I. Lewis
12. The Rise of the Chinese Solar Photovoltaic Industry: Firms, Governments, and Global Competition, Matthew Hopkins and Yin Li

China as an Innovation Nation

Edited by Yu Zhou, William Lazonick, and Yifei Sun

Author Information

Yu Zhou, Professor of Geography, Vassar College,William Lazonick, Professor of Economics, University of Massachusetts Lowell,Yifei Sun, Professor of Geography, California State University

Yu Zhou is a Professor of Geography at Vassar College. She received Bachelor and master degree in urban and environmental sciences at Peking University and her PhD. in Geography at University of Minnesota in 1995. Her research is on globalization and high-tech industry in China, and ethnic communities and transnational business networks in the United States. She is the author of the book The inside story of China's high-tech industry: making Silicon Valley in Beijing (2008). She has received multiple grants and awards, and was selected as one of the Public Intellectual Fellows by National Committee of United States-China Relations.

William Lazonick is Professor of Economics and Director of the Center for Industrial Competitiveness at University of Massachusetts Lowell. He is Co-founder and President of The Academic-Industry Research Network. Lazonick is also a visiting Professor at the University of Ljubljana, the Telecom School of Management, Paris, and the Munk Centre of Global Affairs, University of Toronto. He holds a B.Com from the University of Toronto (1968), M.Sc. (Econ) from the London School of Economics (1969), and Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University (1975). In 1991 Uppsala University awarded him an honorary doctorate for his work on the theory and history of economic development.

Yifei Sun is Professor of Economic Geography at the Department of Geography, California State University, Northridge (CSUN). Dr. Yifei Sun has worked as the principal investigator for two projects supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation. One project examined foreign R&D in China while the other analyzed the technological innovation in China's information communication technology industries. He has published more than thirty articles in leading international journals such as Journal of Economic Geography, Technovation, Regional Studies, Environment and Planning A, and International Journal of Technology Management. Dr. Yifei Sun has co-edited five special issues on China's innovation in reputable international journals such as International Journal of Technology Management, China Review, Environment and Planning A, Asian Pacific Business Review and GeoJournal. He also co-edited one of the first books on foreign R&D in China, entitled "Global R&D in China" (Routledge, 2008)

Contributors:

Shin-Horng CHEN Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research, Taiwan
Debin DU School of Urban and Regional Sciences, East China Normal University, China
Peilei FAN Michigan State University, USA
Kaidong FENG School of Government, Peking University, China
Xudong GAO School of Economics and Management (SEM), Tsinghua University, China
Matt HOPKINS Center for Industrial Competitiveness, University of Massachusetts Lowell, USA
Zhaodong (Tony) HUANG Ningbo University, China
William LAZONICK Center for Industrial Competitiveness, University of Massachusetts Lowell, USA
Joanna I. LEWIS Georgetown University, USA
Yin LI School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA
Ingo LIEFNER Department of Geography, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Germany
Xielin LIU Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Rongfang (Rachel) LIU New Jersey Institute of Technology, USA
Liu (Willow) LV New Jersey Institute of Technology, USA
Yifei SUN Department of Geography, California State University Northridge, USA
Pei-Chang WEN Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research, Taiwan
Zi XUE Shanghai Semiconductor Industry Association, China
Jun ZHANG Department of Geography, University of Toronto, Canada
Gang ZENG School of Urban and Regional Sciences, East China Normal University, China
Yu ZHOU Department of Geography and Geology, Vassar College, USA

China as an Innovation Nation

Edited by Yu Zhou, William Lazonick, and Yifei Sun

Reviews and Awards

"There have been many books about innovation in China recently. This book clearly stands out for its penetrating analysis of the evolutionary process of how industries in China, traditional and high-tech, are climbing the ladder of innovation. It has also demystified some of the controversies around the concept of indigenous innovation. The book not only sheds light on how China has become the world factory over the last 30 years, but also provides clues on where Chinese innovation is going in the next decade. It is a must-read for anyone who wants to understand what is going on in China and how China is going to influence the world." -- Lan Xue, Tsinghua University

"It is a long debated issue whether the government should play an active role in a country's pursuit for higher levels of technological sophistication. This book takes a positive stand over this issue by providing industrial level studies about China's quest for an innovation nation. Attending to details, those studies offer fresh information about how the Chinese government has succeeded or failed to promote innovation in specific industries. This book is definitely worth reading for anyone who is not satisfied by popular but abstract debates about the role of the government." -- Yao Yang, Peking University

"In this important volume, Zhou, Lazonick and Sun have tried to remedy this situation by providing a broad comparative overview of the challenges of innovation faced by late modernizers and by inviting a group of specialists to address issues of innovative performance in key industrial sectors. The volume, thus, makes an important contribution to our understanding of technological innovation in China, and should find a place on the must-read lists of scholars, policymakers, and members of the business community." -- Richard P. Suttmeier, University of Oregon

"The issue of China's innovation prowess continues to occupy the attention of policymakers and business leaders as well as leading scholars across the world. China as an Innovation Nation is one of the first comprehensive books on the PRC innovation effort that actually uses a series of explicit case studies to highlight and analyze the core strengths and shortcomings of Chinese innovative capabilities. The combination of these insightful, well documented case studies taken together, especially those related to high speed rail, integrated circuits, and telecommunications, allows us to better grasp not simply if, but more importantly, when and how China will impact the future trajectory of the prevailing global innovation system. This is a must read for serious observers of the Chinese technology system." -- Denis Simon, Duke Kunshan University

China as an Innovation Nation

Edited by Yu Zhou, William Lazonick, and Yifei Sun

From Our Blog

The transition of China into an innovation nation

The writing is on the wall: China is the world second largest economy and the growth rate has slowed sharply. The wages are rising, so that the fabled army of Chinese cheap labor is now among the most costly in Asian emerging economies. China, in the last thirty years has brought hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, but this miracle would stall unless China can undertake another transformation of becoming an innovation nation.

Posted on October 17, 2016

Read the blog post