From Extraregional Resource Anchoring to Regional System Reconfiguration: New Path Development in the New Energy Vehicle Battery Industry in Changzhou, China

The role of exogenous sources in new path development of regional industries has attracted increasing attention. However, the underlying processes and mechanisms through which external resources and capabilities are mobilized, anchored, and transformed into locally sticky resources that support new path development remain insufficiently understood. This study proposes a multi-actor framework to explain, from a systems perspective, how anchor actors (firms or institutions) and various regional actors mobilize and align extraregional resources to support regional innovation system (RIS) reconfiguration and new industrial path development. Drawing on a case study of the new energy vehicle battery industry in Changzhou, China, this study examines the evolution of an initially organizationally thin RIS through early anchoring failures, strategic re-anchoring, cluster and innovation system formation, and industrial diversification. The Changzhou case suggests that successful anchoring involves three interrelated mechanisms: territorial embeddedness of anchor actors, alignment between external resources and regional capabilities, and system reconfiguration through collective regional agency. The study contributes to RIS and new path development research by revealing how extraregional resource anchoring is facilitated by multi-actor coordination and resource alignment, thereby enabling RIS reconfiguration and the emergence of new industrial paths in regions with organizationally thin RISs.