How Supply Chain Digitization Shapes Green Technology Innovation: Evidence on the Moderation of Media Attention and Institutional Investors

Abstract

In the face of the challenges of the dual carbon strategy, emerging digital technologies are reshaping the landscape of the supply chain and are also transforming the long-term stability and adaptability of green innovation in supply chain firms. Drawing on stakeholder theory and limited-attention theory, this study established a theoretical framework of opportunism behavior and environmentalism behavior on digitization and examined the nonlinear relationship between supply chain digitization and firms’ green technology innovation. Additionally, this study used the machine learning method to construct a supply chain data based on 12,466 firm-year observations from manufacturing firms on supply chain networks. The findings suggest that digitization of upstream and downstream firms has a U-shaped effect on green technology innovation of focal firms from the dual perspectives of opportunism behavior and environmentalism behavior. Importantly, opportunism behavior has a negative mediating effect on the relationship between digitization of upstream and downstream firms and green technology innovation of focal firms. Environmentalism behavior has a positive mediating effect on the relationship between digitization of upstream and downstream firms and green technology innovation of focal firms. Also, we find that media attention and institutional investors positively regulate the nonlinear relationship between digitization of upstream and downstream firms and green technology innovation of focal firms. These findings provide theoretical insights and practical references for the study of digital spillover effects from a supply chain perspective and promoting the development of green supply chains.