From Innovation to Application: The Role of Government Venture Capital in Technology Commercialization

Government venture capital (GVC), embodying both policy and market logics, represents a distinctive hybrid form of financing. This study investigates how GVC influences the process of technology commercialization by examining the interplay between its dual institutional logics. Analyzing a sample of A-share listed firms from 2012 to 2023, we find robust evidence that GVC significantly enhances the level of technology commercialization. Mechanism analyses reveal that this effect operates through three parallel mediation channels: providing resource support, leveraging network advantages, and facilitating benefit and risk sharing. Specifically, GVC alleviates financing constraints, attracts high-caliber talent, strengthens policy coordination and industrial chain integration, optimizes corporate governance, and enables collective risk bearing. Furthermore, the positive effect of GVC on commercialization is more pronounced for private enterprises and in asset-intensive or labor-intensive industries. Our findings offer important theoretical insights and empirical evidence for designing effective government-market coordination mechanisms to bridge the “valley of death” in technology commercialization. JEL code: G24, O38, O31