Factors determining a firm's innovativeness: An empirical study of Chinese e-commerce industry

New endogenous growth theory has emphasized the role of knowledge and innovation in long-run economic growth. Existing literature has paid great attention to the determinants of technological innovation such as firm's internal capacities, regional conditions and social network. However, some researchers have argued that the importance of external factors may be overestimated while firm-specific drivers of innovative performance are undervalued. Moreover, the influences of these factors have been analyzed separately without paying attention to the linkages between them. This study aims to find out how the factors in three dimensions-internal, social and regional explain the differences in firms' innovative activities, and at the same time places emphasis on how firm's internal capacities interact with regional factor and social network to shape firm's innovativeness. The issues are explored using empirical evidence from the specific context of the e-commerce industry in China. It contributes to the literature by expanding resource-based view and integrating it with social network theory.