关键词: 产业链, 脆弱性, 复杂网络, 企业关联

Abstract: In the globalized economic landscape, the stability of the industrial chain and ability of independent control have become key indicators of national competitiveness. In recent years, China has made great strides in the fields of biotechnology, electronic information, artificial intelligence, new energy, high-end equipment manufacturing and other industries, and the complete system of industrial chain modernization is maturing. However, there are still many challenges in this process, such as the lack of core technologies, significant import dependence, unilateral trade protection and fragmentation of industry chain links, etc. A series of events such as the ZTE chip incident in 2018 and the “blacklisting” of China’s aerospace companies by other countries in 2020 exposed China’s weak industrial foundation and core technologies are subject to the “blacklisting” by other countries. This warns us that the security and independent control ability of China’s industrial chain needs to be strengthened urgently to cope with the risks brought about by the new trend of globalization.
   The theory of industrial chain describes the network structure of orderly links and interdependence formed by different industrial fields based on technological and economic links in accordance with a certain logical order and geographical distribution. The industrial chain network has horizontal and vertical multi-dimensional spatial characteristics, in which the vertical product chain consists of the input-output relationship among upstream enterprises, core enterprises and downstream enterprises; the complementary and competitive enterprises within the industrial chain expand the horizontal dimension of the industrial chain network, so that the industrial chain is expanded from a single vertical chain form to a vertical and horizontal network form.
   This paper firstly constructs a network model that can reflect the characteristics of the industrial chain. When constructing the industry chain network model, it is necessary to consider the unique characteristics of the industry chain relative to other networks. The value flow, export trade, knowledge spillover, technology flow and behavioral perception derived from the process of industrial development all lead to the flow of capital, products, knowledge, technology and other factors among entities within the industry chain, which reflects the characteristics of the industry chain network that are different from those of the supply chain network. Therefore, this paper firstly adopts the value engineering theory to transform the entity function of the industry chain into the business relationships between entities, which carry multiple factor flows within the industry chain. Then, in order to solve the problem of quantifying the intensity of factor flows, this paper introduces the urban network analysis method to quantify the intensity of different types of factor flows into the intensity of the association of entities at different levels, such as capital, technology, products, etc., and realizes the industry chain network model that can reflect the characteristics of multiple factor flows.
   In the vulnerability analysis part, this paper constructs an impact probability model, maps the strength of multiple business relationships in the industrial chain into network edge weight indicators, then uses network efficiency indicators to calculate network vulnerability, and further explores the relationship between network topology characteristics and its vulnerability. It is found that: (1)there are a small number of key components within the industrial chain network, the failure of these components will have a significant impact on the function of the whole network, and the excessive concentration of the importance of the entity may bring about systematic risk; (2)the vulnerability value of nodes or edges in the industrial chain network has a significant correlation with the node strength and the centrality of the mediator, and these indexes can serve as a reference basis for the identification of the key vulnerability of the industrial chain; (3)analyzing the vulnerability of the industrial chain entity requires a multidimensional approach. The vulnerability of industrial chain entities requires a multi-dimensional and comprehensive consideration of the different functions of entities, i.e., we need to focus on the vulnerability of entities at the level of different business relationships. The vulnerability of a single entity presents significant heterogeneity under the perspective of different factor flows.

Key words: industrial chain, vulnerability, complex network, firm affiliation