New Venture Growth Strategies in China's High Technology Industries: Internal Growth versus Alliances with Foreign Direct Investment

Dr. Haiyang Li, Assistant Professor, Department of Management

Over the past two decades, China's economic transition from a centrally planned economy to a market economy has greatly stimulated economic growth, thus providing tremendous entrepreneurial opportunities. This is particularly true in high technology industries where over 20,000 new technology ventures have been incubated in this country. In this roundtable discussion, we attempt to address the issues related to new ventures / growth strategies in China. More specifically, we attempt to address the following questions: (a) Under what conditions do Chinese new technology ventures achieve market growth through internal growth strategies (i.e., developing their managerial/marketing capabilities and conducting product innovation)? (b) Under what conditions do Chinese new technology ventures achieve market growth through strategic alliances? (c) What is the role of foreign direct investment in the growth of new technology ventures in China? How do foreign firms (e.g., U.S. firms) effectively manage their strategic alliances with Chinese new technology ventures to obtain market growth in the Chinese market? (d) How do internal growth strategy and the strategy of strategic alliances with multinational firms interact to contribute to market growth of Chinese new technology ventures?