The Driving Forces of Digital Transformation: Navigating Peer Effects in Industrial and Regional Ecosystems

Understanding the systemic synergy of peer effects on digital transformation is essential for overcoming development bottlenecks and stimulating digital vitality across industrial and regional ecosystems. Utilizing data from Chinese A-share listed companies on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges from 2010 to 2024, this study empirically investigates the impact of peer effects on corporate digital transformation and its underlying influencing factors from a systems perspective. The findings reveal significant industry and regional peer effects in corporate digital transformation, indicating that firms’ decision-making is interdependent within broader ecosystems. A greater distance between a focal firm’s prior digital transformation level and that of its peers is associated with a higher level of enthusiasm for such transformation. Similarly, the more a focal firm’s prior performance falls below that of its peers, the stronger its impetus for digital transformation becomes. Furthermore, the influence of the transformation distance on digital transformation enthusiasm exhibits a non-linear threshold effect, which varies with the performance gap. Finally, further analysis indicates that peer effects exert a multiplier effect and that industry-level peer effects in digital transformation significantly enhance firm performance. These conclusions contribute to a deeper understanding of the systemic mechanisms and pathways of corporate digital transformation and offer both theoretical and empirical support for fostering resilient digital economic ecosystems across industries and regions.