How does productive service agglomeration promote manufacturing servitisation from an innovation perspective?

This study is grounded in the theories of service industry agglomeration and technological innovation. It constructs a direct transmission mechanism for the productive service industry's agglomeration to impact manufacturing servitisation and proposes a conceptual model for indirect transmission mechanisms while exploring the mediating effect of technological innovation and the moderating effect of industrial productivity. To validate the model, Chinese listed companies' data from 2006 to 2019 were used for an empirical test, which showed that the agglomeration of the productive service industry can facilitate manufacturing servitisation after the initial inhibition. Technological innovation has a significant mediating effect and plays a positive role in the process of agglomeration in the productive service industry to promote manufacturing servitisation. Industrial productivity has a significantly positive moderating effect on the agglomeration of the productive service industry and technological innovation. It can also enhance the role of technological innovation in manufacturing servitisation, although regional heterogeneity may exist.