Does stage matter? The roles of organizational learning, social network, and corporate entrepreneurship in Chinese new ventures

This study examines the roles of organizational learning, social network and corporate entrepreneurship (CE) in Chinese new ventures at different developmental stages. Several conclusions are drawn from structural equation modeling based on a large sample of 676 new ventures. First, most of the recursive positive relationships are supported by data of the overall sample, such as those between radical CE and exploration, incremental CE and exploitation, and strong ties and exploitation. Second, in the sub-samples, we only find support for the recursive positive relationships between radical CE and exploration, and incremental CE and exploitation among all the three subsamples. Third, for new ventures in the early stage, relationships are emphasized concerning incremental CE, strong ties, and exploitation; for new ventures in the middle stage, new relationships concerning weak ties, exploration, and radical CE come into effect and previous ones still have influence; and for new ventures in the late stage, new relationships begin to dominate and old ones evade.