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Enterprise's R&D and Innovation Management

The Effect of Ambidextrous Boundary-spanning Search on Dis⁃ ruptive Innovation of New Ventures from the Perspective of Insti⁃ tutional Environment 

Li Honggui, Zhu Xian, Guo Qu, Xu Xinyue

(School of Economics and Management, Nanjing Tech University, Nanjing 211816, China)

Abstract: With intensified market competition and the growing prominence of bottlenecks in  core technologies, emerging ventures are in urgent need of leveraging external knowledge to  achieve disruptive breakthroughs. As a vital approach for acquiring heterogeneous external  knowledge and resources, boundary-spanning search not only helps new ventures compensate  for internal capability deficiencies but also provides both theoretical and practical support for  their ability to rapidly respond to market changes and achieve breakthrough development in un⁃ certain environments. This study focuses on new ventures in regions with active entrepreneurial  activity, such as Jiangsu and Guangdong. Data were collected through a questionnaire survey  from 235 new ventures. Reliability and validity analyses were conducted using SPSS and AMOS, and hierarchical regression analysis was applied to examine the differentiated impacts of  boundary-spanning search—specifically, the breadth and depth of market and technological  knowledge—on disruptive innovation in both low-end and new markets. Furthermore, the study  explores the moderating role of the institutional environment in these relationships. The findings  reveal that: ①The breadth and depth of technological knowledge search exert significant positive  effects on both types of disruptive innovation, and the depth of market knowledge search also  demonstrates significant positive effects. However, the breadth of market knowledge search pri⁃ marily drives disruptive innovation in new markets only, possibly because low-end markets em⁃ phasize cost-effectiveness and practical stability, which do not heavily rely on diverse market in⁃ formation. ②Due to the complexity of knowledge integration, ambidextrous strategies (combining  breadth and depth) exhibit differentiated effects. ③The institutional environment significantly  moderates the relationships between ambidextrous strategies and both types of disruptive innova⁃ tion. However, it does not significantly moderate the link between market knowledge search  breadth and disruptive innovation, while it significantly and positively moderates the link be⁃ tween technological knowledge search and both forms of disruptive innovation. This study high⁃ lights the integration paradox of hybrid strategies, where simultaneously pursuing both knowl⁃ edge breadth and depth may constrain each other due to increased integration costs and cogni⁃ tive conflicts, ultimately undermining the effectiveness of disruptive innovation. The findings  provide both theoretical insights and practical guidance for new ventures to develop differenti⁃ ated boundary-spanning strategies tailored to varying institutional environments, to coordinate  knowledge breadth and depth more effectively, and to enhance resource integration efficiency  and disruptive innovation capability. 

Key words: boundary-spanning search; ambidextrous combination strategy; disruptive innova⁃ tion; institutional environment; new ventures