Time: 14:00-15:30, January 3, 2020

Venue: 1621, Rear Main Building, Beijing Normal University

Speaker: Wang Yutao 

Host: Hao Ying

Topic：Does communication matter? The influence of Q & A in site visit on corporate innovation

Abstract

This paper studies whether and how communication between investors and managers impacts corporate innovation by using a unique dataset of Q & A contents of site visits to listed firms in China. Identifying directly investors’ monitoring activities on corporate innovation through recognizing Q & A concerning innovation from visiting contents between investors and corporate, which is difficult and indirect for prior literature, this paper finds that: Firstly, Q & A about innovation in site visits push managers focus more on corporate innovation. Specifically, the more frequent Q & A about innovation in site visits are, the higher the improvement of corporate R&D investment will be afterwards. Secondly, the effects of Q & A about innovation on corporate innovation activities are more pronounced when mutual funds incorporate in the site visits than when other investors incorporate. Third, the effects are also more pronounced when manager talk about innovation in answering the investors’ question than they didn’t do. Forth, the effects are higher in the firms with dual role of manager, higher turnover, and less financial constraints.  Overall, our study extents the literature by identifying Q & A about innovation in site visit as investor activities and the communication between outer stakeholders and inner managers, and presenting the direct evidence on how the activities affect corporate innovation.

Keywords: Corporate site visits; Q & A about innovation; Corporate innovation

Personal Introduction:

Wang Yutao is professor and doctoral supervisor of Business School, Renmin University of China. He is a Doctor of Management of Tsinghua University, a postdoctoral fellow of Accounting of Chinese University of Hong Kong, a Visiting scholar of Texas State University, University of Hong Kong and Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is also a CPA and Asset appraiser in China.

He has published more than 30 papers in Review of Accounting Studies (RAST), Contemporary Accounting Research (CAR),  China Accounting and Finance Review (CAFR), China Journal of Accounting  Research (CJAR), Financial Research, Accounting Research, China Accounting Review, Audit Research, China Industrial Economics and other domestic and foreign academic journals. He has presided over two projects supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, one supported by the Ministry of Education, one supported by the General Research Fund of Hong Kong Government, one supported by the Scientific Research Fund of Renmin University of China, one supported by the Youth Research And Innovation Team project of Central University of Finance and Economics, and one supported by the Teaching Method Research Project of Central University of Finance and Economics. In addition, he has participated in four national Natural Science Foundation projects, two national social science projects (one of which is a key project), three projects of the Ministry of Education, and one education and teaching project of central University of Finance and Economics. He has won the titles of National High-end Accounting Academic Talent of the Ministry of Finance and "Outstanding Young Scholar" of Renmin University of China.