Yanbo Wang
Prof. Yanbo Wang
管理及商業策略
Associate Director, Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Associate Professor

3917 0020

KK 1107

Academic & Professional Qualification
  • Ph.D. MIT Sloan
  • B.A. Peking University
Biography

Yanbo Wang is an Associate Professor of Strategy and Innovation at the University of Hong Kong. He conducts research on technology-based entrepreneurship, with a particular focus on the impact of institutions on startup firms’ strategic choices, organizational forms and financial performance. His current projects map the entrepreneurial landscape in China and examine the design and effect of the country’s state innovation subsidy programs.

Dr. Wang has published in peer-reviewed academic journals such as Management Science, Research Policy, Strategic Management Journal and Administrative Science Quarterly. He serves on the editorial board of Administrative Science Quarterly and Strategic Management Journal.

Dr. Wang received BA in international relations from Peking University and Ph.D. in Management from MIT. Prior to HKU, he has taught at Boston University, Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business and the National University of Singapore, where he served as a doctoral program director in strategy and policy.

Teaching
  • International Entrepreneurship for BBAs and MBAs (BU)
  • Business Model Innovation for MBAs (CKGSB)
  • Technological Innovation for BBAs (NUS)
  • International Strategy for PhDs (NUS)
  • Capstone Course for MGMs (HKU)
Research Interest
  • Technological Change
  • Business Model Innovation
  • Entrepreneurship
Selected Publications
  • “Has China’s Young Thousand Talents program been successful in recruiting and nurturing top-caliber scientists?” (with Dongbo Shi and Weichen Liu), Science, Volume 379 Issue 6627, January 2023, pp. 62-65.
  • “Good to Go First? Position Effects in Expert Evaluation of Early-Stage Ventures” (with Jiang Bian, Jason Greenberg and Jizhen Li), Management Science, Volume 68 Issue 1, January 2022, pp. 300-315.
  • “Fraud and Innovation” (with Toby Stuart and Jizhen Li), Administrative Science Quarterly, Volume 66 Issue 2, June 2021, pp. 267-297.
  • “Firm Performance and State Innovation Funding: Evidence from China’s Innofund Program” (with Jizhen Li and Jeffrey L. Furman), Research Policy, Volume 46 Issue 6, July 2017, pp. 1142-1161.
  • “Social Influence in Career Choice: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment on Entrepreneurial Mentorship” (with Charles Eesley), Research Policy, Volume 46 Issue 3, April 2017, pp. 636-650.
  • “Who Cooks the Books in China, and Does It Pay? Evidence from Private, High-technology Firms” (with Toby Stuart), Strategic Management Journal, Volume 37 Issue 13, December 2016, pp. 2658-2676.
  • “Bringing the Stages Back in: Social Network Ties and Start-up firms’ Access to Venture Capital in China”, Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal, Volume 10 Issue 3, September 2016, pp. 300-317.
  • “Matthew: Effect or Fable?” (with Pierre Azoulay and Toby Stuart), Management Science, Volume 60 Issue 1, January 2014, pp. 92-109.
Service to the University/ Community

Dr. Wang has acted as a reviewer for 15 journals, including AMJ, MS, OS, and IEEE TEM. He is an editorial board member of ASQ and SMJ and serves as an external PhD examiner for the National University of Singapore. He is also an executive board member of Asian Innovation and Entrepreneurship Association (AIEA).

Recent Publications
港大經管學院就人才招聘計劃的成效及影響進行研究

國際知名權威學術期刊《科學》最近發布一篇由港大經管學院王硯波博士及上海交通大學史冬波博士合著的研究文章,題為「中國『青年千人計劃』是否成功招募及培養頂尖科學家」。文章研究中國「千人計劃」中的「青年千人計劃」,在招募和培養頂尖科學家方面的成效。

Good to Go First? Position Effects in Expert Evaluation of Early-Stage Ventures

There is often considerable anxiety and conflicting advice concerning the benefits of presenting/being evaluated first. We thus investigate how expert evaluators vary in their evaluations of entrepreneurial proposals based upon the order in which they are evaluated. Our research setting is a premiere innovation fund competition in Beijing, China, where the prize money at stake is economically meaningful, and evaluators are quasi-randomly assigned to evaluate written grant proposals without the possibility of peer influence. This enables us to credibly recover a causal position effect. We also theorize and test how heterogeneity in evaluators’ prior (context-specific) judging experience moderates position effects. Overall, we find that a proposal evaluated first requires total assets in the top 10th percentile to merely equal the evaluation of a proposal in the bottom 10th percentile that is not evaluated first. Firm and evaluator fixed-effects models yield consistent findings. We consider evaluation design elements that may mollify these position effects in the discussion section.

詐騙與創新

我們的研究發現有詐騙行為的公司與作風誠實正當的公司在資源分配方面迥異不同。以詐騙方式獲取的資源傾向被視為不勞而獲的收益,因此較少會用於投資具生產效益的活動,例如招聘人才。我們假設作風誠實正當的公司與有詐騙行為的公司會投資不同類別的創新發明:作風誠實正當的公司追求重要的技術性發明;而有詐騙行為的公司則傾向進行低价值型的投資,且避免投資具挑戰性的機會,著重外觀型专利的申请多於實際性發明专利的申请。我們運用跨时间段的数据驗證上述假設。我們追蹤了467間中國高科技公司的人才招聘及專利申請活動,而這些公司都申請了國家創新基金資助。透過比較每間公司在同一財政年度的兩套財務報表,我們找出詐騙的端倪。縱使法律上要求兩套財務報表必須相同,但超過一半的財務報表存在差異,而這些差異均有利於該公司。我們發現相對於作風誠實正當的公司,有詐騙行為的公司更加可能獲得國家的创新基金補助,但他们很少在獲得補助後招聘技术人材或進行实质性的研發活动。