Obtaining sustainable competitive advantage through collaborative dual innovation: empirical analysis based on mature enterprises in eastern China

In an increasingly competitive market environment, dual innovation which include exploitative innovation and exploratory innovation has become a magic weapon for enterprises to improve performance. This study identifies the mechanism of how collaborative dual innovation influence sustainable competitive advantage, and tests its intermediary role in innovation performance. Using the survey data of 256 mature enterprises in China, this study finds that collaborative dual innovation positively affects the sustainable competitive advantage of mature enterprises through partial mediation of innovation performance. In addition, it shows that the two dimensions of collaborative dual innovation, dual innovation balance (DIB) and dual innovation complementation (DIC), have different impact mechanisms and paths on enterprises' competitive advantage. While DIB has a direct effect on the competitive advantage, DIC strongly affects the competitive advantage both directly and indirectly through the mediating effect of innovation performance. This study sheds new insight of the interaction between dual innovation and sustainable competitive advantage, and provides a guidance to enterprises how carry out dual innovation effectively to maintain sustainable competitive advantages.