Digital Technology Adoption: Go Together With Supply Chain Partners

With the rapid development of digital technology, such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, and big data, digital technology adoption has become a strategic choice for firms to maintain competitiveness in a dynamic market. As an important technology investment input, firms should have a holistic consideration of their level of digital technology adoption, focusing on the entire supply chain. Using empirical evidence from the data of listed companies in China from 2007 to 2022, we find that a higher discrepancy in the level of digital technology adoption between the focal firm and its suppliers and customers negatively affects the focal firm's financial performance. Additionally, the focal firm's own capabilities, including bargaining and innovation capabilities, play a negative moderating role in the impact of digital technology adoption discrepancy, which can mitigate the negative impact of the gap in digital technology adoption between itself and its suppliers and customers on the firm's financial performance. Our findings thus provide implications for firms to implement a “go-together” approach to match their digital technology adoption level with their partners' to synchronize the adoption level of digital technology along the entire supply chain and enhance their negotiation and innovation capabilities to improve their resilience and sustainable development.