数字化转型、企业适度规模与并购行为  

Digital Transformation, Optimal Firm Scale and Mergers & Acquisitions

作　　者：蓝发钦[1] 周胜娣 Lan Faqin;Zhou Shengdi

机构地区：[1]华东师范大学经济与管理学院,200062

出　　处：《世界经济》2025年第4期197-228,共32页The Journal of World Economy

基　　金：国家社会科学基金重点项目(23AJL009);国家自然科学基金面上项目(72173045);上海市社会科学基金项目(2022ZJB006)的资助。

摘　　要：本文从科斯的企业理论出发,将数字化转型引入企业生产决策模型,考察数字化转型对企业并购行为的影响及其机理。研究发现:数字化转型显著降低了企业的并购意愿,该结论在考虑内生性和稳健性后仍然成立。机制分析表明,数字化转型的交易成本效应更加显著,因此企业将生产和交易更多转向市场,“阻止”企业规模的外移,印证了科斯等人关于交易成本与一体化的论述。进一步研究发现,数字化转型对企业并购的影响在资本密集型企业、竞争程度低的行业、高科技产业聚集地区更加显著,且有助于提升企业的全要素生产率。研究结果启示数字化减少了企业对并购活动的需求和依赖,实现了与外部合作伙伴更广泛地互动和资源共享。The widespread adoption of digital technologies has fundamentally altered the balance between market transactions and internal organisation, necessitating a reassessment of traditional firm boundary theories in the digital age. Coase's theory of firm boundaries posits that a firm's optimal scale hinges on the trade-off between market transaction costs and internal organisational costs, with dynamic adjustments as the cost structure evolves. Digital transformation disrupts this equilibrium. Technologies such as big data analytics, smart contracts and blockchain mitigate market frictions(e. g., information search, negotiation and monitoring costs), reducing reliance on vertical integration and fostering greater specialisation. Concurrently, they enhance internal coordination, transparency and operational efficiency,reducing organisational and managerial costs. This dual effect renders firm-scale reconfiguration theoretically inevitable and empirically demonstrable. As a primary mechanism for internalising production and transactions, mergers and acquisitions(M&A) offer a critical lens through which to examine these boundary shifts. Analysing how digital transformation influences corporate M&A behaviour — and its underlying mechanisms — provides key insights into the evolving nature of firm boundaries and resource allocation. These insights advance theoretical discourse and inform corporate strategy in the digital economy.Using data from Chinese A-share listed firms between 2012 and 2022, this study empirically demonstrates that digital transformation significantly reduces firms' M&A propensity — a finding robust to endogeneity checks and sensitivity tests. Mechanism analyses reveal that the transaction cost effect dominates, prompting firms to shift production and transactions towards market-based solutions rather than internal expansion, thereby curbing the outward expansion of firm boundaries. This result corroborates Coase's theoretical linkage between transaction costs and integration decisions. Further a

关 键 词：数字化转型 企业并购 适度规模 均衡边界 

分 类 号：F272[经济管理—企业管理]