Analysis of Technology Mergers and Acquisitions on Enterprises’ Green Technology Innovation: Moderating Effects of Environmental Regulation and Environmental Uncertainty

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

·         Clarification is needed on Hypothesis Formulation: Please ensure that the hypotheses are well-supported by existing literature to enhance the theoretical foundation of the study.

·         Clarification is needed on Research Variables and Model: Please provide a detailed rationale for the selected variables and justify the adoption of the research model.

·         Discussion of Research Limitations: It is crucial to clearly discuss the research limitations encountered during the study.

 

·         Inclusion of Future Research Perspectives: It would be beneficial to include a section on future research perspectives.

Author Response

Reviewer 1
Ensure hypotheses are well-supported by existing literature.
Provide detailed rationale and justification for selected variables and research model.
Clearly discuss research limitations.
Include a section on future research perspectives.
Reply to Academic Reviewer 1:

• We agree with the first suggestion of “Ensure hypotheses are well-supported by existing literature”. We modified it with rewriting the Part Two of “Theoretical Mechanisms and Research Hypotheses” in this article in three ways: giving the detailed tiles of 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4 and 2.5; adding more literatures from No.60 reference to No.78 reference; rewriting the descriptions from hypotheses2 to hypotheses5 (p9-15 in red lines).
• We agree with the second suggestion of “Provide detailed rationale and justification for selected variables and research model”. We modified the Part Three of “Research Design”, rewrite the sample selection and data source in page 15 and 16, and we give the details of model building process in page 18 and 19.
• We agree with the third suggestion of “Clearly discuss research limitations Include a section on future research perspectives”. We modified the last part of “Research conclusions and future research”, and add new contents of further discussions and future research.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors,

This paper investigates and presents an overview of the topic, highlighting the relevance of analyzing technological mergers and acquisitions (M&A) for green innovation in companies. This topic is current and relevant as technology mergers and acquisitions (M&A) significantly impact companies and the economy in general. Analyzing how these operations affect green innovation, we can better understand how companies adapt to environmental and regulatory demands. Furthermore, green innovation is crucial for long-term sustainability and addressing the challenges of climate change. Therefore, understanding the role of M&A in this context is fundamental.

However, after a thorough review, it was found that although the article offers valuable insights, it lacks supporting literature, methodological details, and additional discussions. Another aspect that authors must review is the clarity and coherence of the written text. The sentences are very long, and there is a lot of repetition of information. Ideas must be presented logically, and arguments must be well connected.

Addressing and incorporating the points indicated in the attached file will strengthen the quality and coherence of your manuscript.

 

Best regards and good work. 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Reviewer 2
The manuscript lacks supporting literature, methodological details, and additional discussions.
Improve the clarity and coherence of the text, ensuring logical presentation and well-connected arguments.
Add methodological details and support from the literature.

Reply to Academic Reviewer 2:

(1) We agree with the first suggestion of “The manuscript lacks supporting literature, methodological details, and additional discussions”. We add more than 28 new published SSCI articles in the references, and use the conclusions and opinions to support the manuscript. We also add some more descriptions about the methodology and model building in page 18. The additional discussions are also added in page 31 and page 32.

(2) We agree with the second suggestion of “Improve the clarity and coherence of the text, ensuring logical presentation and well-connected arguments”. We read the article from start to the end, and correct lots of misunderstandings and grammar errors.

(3) We agree with the third suggestion of “Add methodological details and support from the literature”. We add new details about the sample selection and data sources in page 15 and page 16, we also correct the description about the model building in this article.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Authors

This research aims to examine the impact of Technology M&A on Corporate Green Innovation with a multiple moderating Effects of Regional Environmental Regulation, education level and Environmental Uncertainty, taking A-share listed companies in China from 2007 to 2021 as a sample. The authors have developed a relevant and contemporary academic and scientific discussion therefore the paper could be accepted to give a change to the authors to review and reorganize better their concept on the subject matter in this article.

Analysis:

Strengths:

1. This research uses different approaches to investigate the subject, indicating a triple moderator effect on green innovation and robust conclusion of different types of M&A on the outcome. The study is also intended to give a national picture of the green technology innovation of enterprises across China. So the study is more of a contemporary situation of the technological innovation, employing a robust list of theoretical and statistical instruments of analysis.

Weaknesses:

1. Lack of clarity for the data selection to support the methodology.

2. Lack of clarity of some variables.

3. The reason for the time scope for the analysis is not convincingly addressed.

4. Non consistence of formula used

5. Lack of distinction between some sections

6. The discussion looses its focus in the conclusion

 

Recommendations:

The objective of this research is obvious and the authors have already shown a high level of work done, however, the paper still needs some aspects to improve.

First of all, what is the difference between sections

2.1. Corporate green innovation motivations and dilemmas

and

2.3. Corporate green innovation motivations and dilemmas

Secondly, the theoretical model diagram in Figure 1 does not reflect H1a and H1b. In fact the hypothesis development does made mention any H1. A more serious theoretical problem is, how do you reconcile H1a and H1b especially they have opposite effect. With H1a and H1b having contrary effects, what will be their conbined effect H1a, the hypothesis development sector makes not mention of that effect.

On another note, the hypotheses H1a and H2b, do not look like the conclusion of all the explanation the happen earlier in the sector 2. The hypothesis should reflect exactly the argument you develop prio. Besides, i could see the M&A frequency developed or explained earlier. So i am totally surprised to see something like that appearing the hypothesis.

Similarly, what do the authors define such important variable such as M&A frequency “Number of technology acquisitions by enterprises during the year”. When the authors say M&A frequency can significantly produce a positive incentive effect on...it is unclear if that’s higher frequency and lower frequency. It should be specified the effect of the level of frequency, or either higher or lower level of M&A does does not affect the outcome. The authors rather saw importance of making such distinction with the moderating variables.

 

Further more in section 3.2.3. Moderating variables, below the formula it is written “Where represents the proportion of board members who possess a certain characteristic to the whole board members, and the larger the value of H, the higher the degree of diversity.” It is not clear what the authors want to say there.

In fact, i couldn’t appreciate or reconcile the first formula and the bench mark regression. The first one says H= 1-∑.... but the benchmark is H=a+...

An interesting section of the types of M&A was not fully developed, probably because that is not the focus of this discussion. One may ask, do the types of M&A have the same effect in different industries?  

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Reviewer 3
Clarify the abstract, ensure proper sourcing in the introduction, and specify the study's focus on Chinese firms.
Update the literature review with more recent references.
Explain the choices related to the studied time period, databases considered, and data harmonization.
Enhance the discussion section to provide additional results and insights.
Strengthen the conclusions to connect with the rest of the paper.

Reply to Academic Reviewer 3:

• We agree with the first suggestion of “Clarify the abstract, ensure proper sourcing in the introduction, and specify the study's focus on Chinese firms “. We clarify the abstract by rewriting the abstract again, and we add some policies on green innovation in China which can help to prove why we focus on Chinese firms in page 1 and page 2.
• We agree with the second suggestion of “Update the literature review with more recent references”. We add some more than 28 new references, and 80% of them are published between the year 2022 and 2024 which can be found from page 33 to page 36.
• We agree with the third suggestion of “Explain the choices related to the studied time period, databases considered, and data harmonization”. We add a paragraph description “For China, the government clearly puts forward the construction of a "beautiful China" and the promotion of a "green development" strategy after the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China....” to explain the choices of the time period.
• We agree with the fourth suggestion of “Enhance the discussion section to provide additional results and insights, strengthen the conclusions to connect with the rest of the paper”. We add the new parts of “further discussion”, “further research” in the last part of the article, and try to connect it with the rest of the paper.
• As for the difference between 2.1 and 2.3, we think that we made a wrong title for the 2.3, and we modified all the tiles in the correct way from 2.1 to 2.5 (page 3 to page 14).
• As for the hypotheses H1a and H1b, we modified it into just H1 including the supporting literatures (page 8). Firstly, we gave the H1a for the positive effect and the H1b for the negative effect, and we found it is actually having a positive effect between technology M&A and green innovation through data testing.
• As for the variable of “M&A frequency”, we check it again with the definition, M&A frequency refers to the number of M&A transactions carried out by enterprises in a certain period. Hence, we use “Number of technology acquisitions by enterprises during the year” to measure the variable of “M&A frequency”.
• We rewrite and check the formular of 2.2.3 and made the modification of the description again. We agree with the reviewer’s opinion “The types of M&A do have the different effects in different industries”, so we do the testing between private enterprises and state-owned enterprises as the latter on has a stronger government connection in China. However, it also needs to do further research on the effects on different industries and it is interesting topic.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Authors,

 

Congratulations on your effort in creating the paper titled "Analysis of Technology M&A on Corporate Green Innovation: Moderating Effects of Regional Environmental Regulation and Environmental Uncertainty."

 

Here are some suggestions for improving your work:

1.     Abstract: Using "etc." is not appropriate as it can lead to confusion. The abstract does not clearly present the purpose of the study or the research method used.

2.     Introduction: For example, the first paragraph contains several statements without specified sources. In the first reference, there's a period at the end of the sentence, followed by "Makri et al [1]" and another period. This seems to be an editing error. After the research question, when mentioning the selected firms for empirical research, it is omitted that the study is limited to firms in China. Additionally, "impact" analysis implies a clear methodology, which is not adhered to in this paper. Furthermore, the first point in the originality and importance statement is not met from either a theoretical or empirical perspective.

3.     Chapter Two (Literature Review): The literature review contains outdated references. The most recent work cited is from 2021, with two other works published five years ago. The rest of the bibliography is over five years old, which is unacceptable for a topic related to innovation, considering the rapid technological changes in recent years.

4.     Chapter Three (Methodology): This section is clear and well-structured. However, it could explain the choices related to the studied time period, the two databases considered, the adjustments made to harmonize data from both databases, and more.

5.     Chapters Four, Five, and Six (Research Results): Although Chapter Six is titled "Further Discussion," it only contains additional results.

6.     Chapter Seven (Conclusions): This chapter is very brief and does not adequately connect with the rest of the paper.

General Comments: The paper has good potential, provided that certain aspects, such as those mentioned above, are corrected. However, it gives the impression that the large volume of data has caused some confusion regarding the objective pursued. My recommendation is to rethink the objective. Define an achievable objective, considering the limitation of the empirical research to a single country. Then, select from the presented results those that lead to achieving the objective. Subsequently, create a section where the results are discussed, to finally have pertinent conclusions for the research conducted.

 

Best of luck!

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Minor editing of English language required.

Author Response

Here are some suggestions for improving your work:

1. Abstract: Using "etc." is not appropriate as it can lead to confusion. The abstract does not clearly present the purpose of the study or the research method used.

Author’s Reply: we agree with this good suggestion, and we rewrite the abstract in correct way (page 1).

2. Introduction: For example, the first paragraph contains several statements without specified sources. In the first reference, there's a period at the end of the sentence, followed by "Makri et al [1]" and another period. This seems to be an editing error. After the research question, when mentioning the selected firms for empirical research, it is omitted that the study is limited to firms in China. Additionally, "impact" analysis implies a clear methodology, which is not adhered to in this paper. Furthermore, the first point in the originality and importance statement is not met from either a theoretical or empirical perspective.

Author’s Reply: We agree with the first suggestion of “The manuscript lacks supporting literature, methodological details, and additional discussions”. We add more than 28 new published SSCI articles in the references, and use the conclusions and opinions to support the manuscript. We also add some more descriptions about the methodology and model building in page 18. The additional discussions are also added in page 31 and page 32.

We agree with the third suggestion of “Add methodological details and support from the literature”. We add new details about the sample selection and data sources in page 15 and page 16, we also correct the description about the model building in this article.

 

3. Chapter Two (Literature Review): The literature review contains outdated references. The most recent work cited is from 2021, with two other works published five years ago. The rest of the bibliography is over five years old, which is unacceptable for a topic related to innovation, considering the rapid technological changes in recent years.

Author’s Reply: We agree with the second suggestion of “Update the literature review with more recent references”. We add some more than 28 new references, and 80% of them are published between the year 2022 and 2024 which can be found from page 33 to page 36.

 

4. Chapter Three (Methodology): This section is clear and well-structured. However, it could explain the choices related to the studied time period, the two databases considered, the adjustments made to harmonize data from both databases, and more.

Author’s Reply: We agree with the second suggestion of “Provide detailed rationale and justification for selected variables and research model”. We modified the Part Three of “Research Design”, rewrite the sample selection and data source in page 15 and 16, and we give the details of model building process in page 18 and 19.

We also modified some details introducing the time period and databased in the page 1, page 2, page 15-16 and page 18.

 

5. Chapters Four, Five, and Six (Research Results): Although Chapter Six is titled "Further Discussion," it only contains additional results.

Author’s Reply: We agree with this suggestion, it may make a mistake, and we change the title of it.

 

6. Chapter Seven (Conclusions): This chapter is very brief and does not adequately connect with the rest of the paper.

Author’s Reply: We agree with this suggestion, and we modified the last part of “Research conclusions and future research”, and add new contents of further discussions and future research.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors,

Thanks for the opportunity to review your article again. It is possible to see that some substantial improvements have been made, however there are fundamental aspects that have not been considered. So I encourage you to consider the points for further refinement.

Approach and incorporation of the points indicated in the attached file will reinforce the quality and consistency of your manuscript.

Regards and good work.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Reply to Reviewer 2 Report in Round 2

Abstract - The title refers to analyzing the moderating effects of Regional Environmental Regulation and Environmental Uncertainty, but the abstract does not mention this objective. This aspect must be added. - The authors use “A-share listed companies in China from 2007 to 2021” to develop the paper. Still, they do not mention how many companies and their characterization were analyzed or what methodology was developed.

Reply: Thanks for the reviewer’s good comments, and we agree with the suggestions. We add the moderating effects and sample size with the sentence of “We take A-share listed companies in China from 2007 to 2021 as a sample, finally use 1577 technology M&A samples to examine the impact of technology M&A and M&A frequency on enterprise green technology innovation, as well as the moderating effects of regional environmental regulation, environmental uncertainty and board members' educational background” in the part of abstract.

 

Introduction

- The authors use very long sentences, which makes the paper difficult to read. This aspect needs to be reviewed throughout the paper. For example, when the authors say, “Enterprises are the core carrier of creating social and economic wealth, but also the natural resources demander, enterprise green technology innovation is the most critical factor and micro-carrier for the development of ecological, environmental protection. “ or “However, green technology innovation has positive externalities, especially under the current conditions of technical knowledge protection and carbon trading and other environmental protection compensation market pricing mechanism is not yet perfect, enterprises invested funds and R&D personnel take up a large amount of internal resources, and cannot enjoy the due benefits and cost compensation brought by green technology, enterprises are usually reluctant to actively invest in research and development of new green technology.”, these sentences contain distinct aspects that should be separated for an easier and more logical interpretation of the facts.

Reply: Thanks for the reviewer’s good comments, and we agree with the suggestions. We accept that lots of sentences are too long to read in this article, and we check on the all the sentences one by one throughout the article and make the sentences shortly and clearly to read. In order to make the sentence easier to read, some long sentences are divided into two short sentences in the article.

 - There is one more final point when referencing “.Makri et al [1].”. This aspect must be corrected. - The authors state, “In view of this, we take the M&A events of A-share listed companies in 2007-2021 as the research object, and empirically examine the impact of M&A technology on corporate green technology innovation.”, and the Moderating Effects of Regional Environmental Regulation and Environmental Uncertainty? Isn't that also a goal of the study? Here, it is also necessary to indicate how many companies are part of the sample and what type of analysis was developed. - Finally, the last paragraph must refer to the structure of the paper.

Reply: Thanks for the reviewer’s good comments, and we agree with the suggestions. We modify the error of “.Makri et al [1].” In page 2.

We also modified the sentences in the last of the introduction as “In the view of this, we take the M&A events of A-share listed companies in 2007-2021 as the research object which finally includes 1577 technology M&A samples. Mean-while, the research goal of this study is to empirically examine the impact of technolo-gy M&A on enterprise green technology innovation as well as the moderating effects of regional environmental regulation, environmental uncertainty and board members' educational background. The research methods of benchmark regression model and heterogeneity analysis are used to do the empirical research including descriptive sta-tistical analysis, baseline regression analysis, moderating effects testing, heterogeneity analysis and mechanical testing in this research.” (page 3)

 

Theoretical Mechanisms and Research Hypotheses

- If the objective of hypothesis 2 is to verify the moderating role of regional environmental regulation, then the research hypothesis is poorly formulated. The moderating effect analyzes the impact of a given variable on the relationship between other variables. As presented, I analyze with this hypothesis whether Technology M&A and its frequency on green technology innovation capability is more significant in regions with higher environmental regulatory intensity and not analyzing the moderating effect of the environmental regulatory variable on the relationship between Technology M&A and Corporate Green Innovation. The same happens with hypotheses 3 and 4, which must also be reformulated.

Reply: Thanks for the reviewer’s good comments, and we agree with the suggestions.

The hypotheses of moderating effects with hypotheses 3, 4, 5 are not described in the right and normal form. We should describe with the existence of the moderating variable, the direct connection between technology M &A and green technology innovation becomes stronger.

Hence, we rewrite the three parts of moderating hypotheses with 2.5.1, 2.5.2 and 2.5.3 (page 6-page 9).

- For a more straightforward reading of Figure 1, it should indicate all the hypotheses intended to be analyzed and include the influence of each hypothesis (positive or negative).

- It makes no sense to put “Direct Effect” in hypothesis 1, as the arrow indicates this relationship.

- The references “Internal moderating Effect” and “External moderating Effect” must be at the ends, outside the figure to avoid confusion.

Reply: Thanks for the reviewer’s good comments, and we agree with the suggestions. We modified the figure 1 by adding the positive or negative symbol, and deleting the “Internal moderating Effect” and “External moderating Effect” in case of misunderstanding.

 

Empirical Test and Results

- The Results are not presented scientifically (example: (β=0.32; z=1.92; p<0.10).

- All tables must indicate which significance levels are used.

On the other hand, the interconnection with the hypotheses is not made, identifying whether they

are supported. This appearance must be corrected.

- The authors refer to “hypothesis 2 is verified.”. This language should not be used as it

is not scientific and should be replaced by “Hypothesis 2 is supported”.

Reply: Thanks for the reviewer’s good comments, and we agree with the suggestions. We check on all the data in the tables and make sure they are correct and logical, and all table use the significance levels.

We add the “Hence, the hypotheses 1 is supported, and the hypotheses 2 is not supported in this study” in page 20, to make the interconnection from the results of table 3 and the hypotheses 1 and hypotheses 2.

We write “supported” to change the “verified” in the page 21, page22 and page 33.

 

Further discussion

- How does the discussion of results continue to present results? -In this moment, the paper features 2 points of “Further Discussion”. Point 6 and point 7.2. This aspect should be fixed.

- Subitems “6.1.1. Nature of property rights” and “6.1.2. Nature of property rights” are the same title?

Reply: Thanks for the reviewer’s good comments, and we agree with the suggestions. It is actually a wrong title of the point 6 with its contents, so we change the tile of point 6 from “Further Discussion” to “Heterogeneity Tests and Mechanism Tests” and keep the point 7.2 with “Further Discussion”. (page 25, page 31)

We also check all the titles in point 6 and make some changes in order to meet with their contents discussed. Such as, we name the 6.1.1 with “Heterogeneity analysis of property right nature”, and 6.1.2 with “Heterogeneity analysis of government’s support on technology innovation”. (page 25)

 

Research conclusions and policy implications

- The conclusions are very superficial and address aspects that were not analyzed in the results nor defined in the research hypotheses, namely, “Among the three types of M&A, horizontal technology M&A has no significant effect on green technology innovation, vertical technology M&A has a more obvious effect on enhancing green technology innovation, and mixed technology M&A inhibits green technology innovation.”

Reply: Thanks for the reviewer’s good comments, and we agree with the suggestions. We check on the conclusion, and this conclusion (4) is connected with chapter 6.3 “Exploring types of M&A innovation”, it divided the M&A innovation into horizontal M&A, vertical M&A and hybrid M&A, and the results can be found in table 14 (page 30). We also check from start to the end, to find the similar misunderstanding and make some modifications.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors have reviewed the paper according to the recommendations and I think the paper is acceptable in its current state.

Author Response

Replies to Review 3

1. This research uses different approaches to investigate the subject, indicating a triple moderator effect on green innovation and robust conclusion of different types of M&A on the outcome. The study is also intended to give a national picture of the green technology innovation of enterprises across China. So the study is more of a contemporary situation of the technological innovation, employing a robust list of theoretical and statistical instruments of analysis.

Weaknesses:

1. Lack of clarity for the data selection to support the methodology.
2. Lack of clarity of some variables.
3. The reason for the time scope for the analysis is not convincingly addressed.
4. Non consistence of formula used
5. Lack of distinction between some sections
6. The discussion looses its focus in the conclusion

 Authors Reply:

We agree with the first suggestion of “Clarify the abstract, ensure proper sourcing in the introduction, and specify the study's focus on Chinese firms “. We clarify the abstract by rewriting the abstract again, and we add some policies on green innovation in China which can help to prove why we focus on Chinese firms in page 1 and page 2.

We agree with the second suggestion of “Update the literature review with more recent references”. We add some more than 28 new references, and 80% of them are published between the year 2022 and 2024 which can be found from page 33 to page 36.

We agree with the third suggestion of “Explain the choices related to the studied time period, databases considered, and data harmonization”. We add a paragraph description “For China, the government clearly puts forward the construction of a "beautiful China" and the promotion of a "green development" strategy after the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China....” to explain the choices of the time period.

We agree with the fourth suggestion of “Enhance the discussion section to provide additional results and insights, strengthen the conclusions to connect with the rest of the paper”. We add the new parts of “further discussion”, “further research” in the last part of the article, and try to connect it with the rest of the paper.

 

Recommendations:

The objective of this research is obvious and the authors have already shown a high level of work done, however, the paper still needs some aspects to improve.

First of all, what is the difference between sections

2.1. Corporate green innovation motivations and dilemmas

and

2.3. Corporate green innovation motivations and dilemmas

Secondly, the theoretical model diagram in Figure 1 does not reflect H1a and H1b. In fact the hypothesis development does made mention any H1. A more serious theoretical problem is, how do you reconcile H1a and H1b especially they have opposite effect. With H1a and H1b having contrary effects, what will be their conbined effect H1a, the hypothesis development sector makes not mention of that effect.

Authors Reply:

As for the difference between 2.1 and 2.3, we think that we made a wrong title for the 2.3, and we modified all the tiles in the correct way from 2.1 to 2.5 (page 3 to page 14).

As for the hypotheses H1a and H1b, we modified it into just H1 including the supporting literatures (page 8). Firstly, we gave the H1a for the positive effect and the H1b for the negative effect, and we found it is actually having a positive effect between technology M&A and green innovation through data testing.

On another note, the hypotheses H1a and H2b, do not look like the conclusion of all the explanation the happen earlier in the sector 2. The hypothesis should reflect exactly the argument you develop prio. Besides, i could see the M&A frequency developed or explained earlier. So i am totally surprised to see something like that appearing the hypothesis.

Similarly, what do the authors define such important variable such as M&A frequency “Number of technology acquisitions by enterprises during the year”. When the authors say M&A frequency can significantly produce a positive incentive effect on...it is unclear if that’s higher frequency and lower frequency. It should be specified the effect of the level of frequency, or either higher or lower level of M&A does does not affect the outcome. The authors rather saw importance of making such distinction with the moderating variables.

 Further more in section 3.2.3. Moderating variables, below the formula it is written “Where represents the proportion of board members who possess a certain characteristic to the whole board members, and the larger the value of H, the higher the degree of diversity.” It is not clear what the authors want to say there.

In fact, i couldn’t appreciate or reconcile the first formula and the bench mark regression. The first one says H= 1-∑.... but the benchmark is H=a+...

An interesting section of the types of M&A was not fully developed, probably because that is not the focus of this discussion. One may ask, do the types of M&A have the same effect in different industries?  

Authors Reply:

As for the variable of “M&A frequency”, we check it again with the definition, M&A frequency refers to the number of M&A transactions carried out by enterprises in a certain period. Hence, we use “Number of technology acquisitions by enterprises during the year” to measure the variable of “M&A frequency”.

We rewrite and check the formular of 2.2.3 and made the modification of the description again. We agree with the reviewer’s opinion “The types of M&A do have the different effects in different industries”, so we do the testing between private enterprises and state-owned enterprises as the latter on has a stronger government connection in China. However, it also needs to do further research on the effects on different industries and it is interesting topic.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Authors,

I congratulate you on the improvements made to your paper. From my point of view, there are no longer any major issues that need to be corrected.

Wishing you good luck!

Author Response

Dear judges,

First of all, please allow me to take this opportunity to express my deepest gratitude to you. In the busy work and research, you spare precious time to review my paper in detail. I deeply admire your professionalism and rigorous attitude towards academic work.

Your review comments are not only comprehensive and profound, but also very constructive. They not only point out the shortcomings in my paper, but also provide valuable suggestions for revision, and point out the direction for my subsequent research and improvement. These valuable feedbacks are not only an important help for my academic growth, but also the source of motivation for my continuous pursuit of academic excellence.

In the process of preparing the paper, I know that every step embodies the wisdom and sweat of countless predecessors and colleagues, and your review is undoubtedly another important test and improvement of this process. Your professional guidance and selfless sharing have made me deeply understand the rigor and challenge of academic research, and also strengthened my determination to continue on this road.

Thank you again for your hard work and careful guidance! I have carefully absorbed each of your suggestions and revised and improved the paper. I look forward to having more opportunities to consult you and make progress together in the future academic road.

 

With regards，

All authors and Chao

Round 3

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors,
Thank you for reviewing your work considering the points highlighted. They did a good job. 
Best wishes for success.
Best regards.

 

Author Response

Dear judges,

First of all, please allow me to take this opportunity to express my deepest gratitude to you. In the busy work and research, you spare precious time to review my paper in detail. I deeply admire your professionalism and rigorous attitude towards academic work.

Your review comments are not only comprehensive and profound, but also very constructive. They not only point out the shortcomings in my paper, but also provide valuable suggestions for revision, and point out the direction for my subsequent research and improvement. These valuable feedbacks are not only an important help for my academic growth, but also the source of motivation for my continuous pursuit of academic excellence.

In the process of preparing the paper, I know that every step embodies the wisdom and sweat of countless predecessors and colleagues, and your review is undoubtedly another important test and improvement of this process. Your professional guidance and selfless sharing have made me deeply understand the rigor and challenge of academic research, and also strengthened my determination to continue on this road.

Thank you again for your hard work and careful guidance! I have carefully absorbed each of your suggestions and revised and improved the paper. I look forward to having more opportunities to consult you and make progress together in the future academic road.

 

With regards，

All authors and Chao