What Is Necessary for Digital Transformation of Large Manufacturing Companies? A Necessary Condition Analysis

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I recommend editing the title of this paper.

The abstract must written in a more interesting way.  It must state the research's importance, methodology, main results, and managerial and scientific contributions. It should be written to make the readers interested in reading the full article.

on line 75 you write:  „There are: This study aims to identify ..............“  and you are referring to the source [12].   The authors' own contribution is unclear.

Line 342: I recommend adding the criteria on which the selection of companies was based. In order to assess the relevance of the selection.

Line 573: The structure of the chapter discussion was inappropriately chosen. The conclusion should be a separate chapter.

Author Response

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Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper presents the necessary conditions for the Digital Transformation of Large Manufacturing Companies.  The work can be published after a major revision made in accordance with the following remarks:

1. The paper describes “What is Necessary for Digital Transformation of Large Manufacturing Companies?” and gives four necessary conditions, but these are human-caused software conditions. Hardware conditions are also important factors for digital transformation, and relevant clarifications are suggested.

2. Section 2.1 of the paper cites a large number of literature to introduce the "Research Framework", which is more suitable for the "Introduction" section.

3. The paper is based on the AMO theoretical framework, how it relates to the "digital transformation of large manufacturing companies" and how the theory can be utilized is not clearly explained in the paper.

4. Symbols such as “+NC+” and "-NC+" are too similar to be easily distinguished, and it is suggested that they be changed to other forms of expression.

5.  Figure 2 is not presented clearly enough, does the intercept affect the results?

6. Section 3.2 on Data suggests a more detailed explanation of how the contents of the WIND and CSMAR databases are related to the Variable in the paper.

7. Figure 3 is not clear and needs to be modified.

8. The conclusions and outlook section is proposed to be a separate chapter and streamlined.

Author Response

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Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors This paper evaluated the factors that influence the digital transformation of enterprises and their positive/negative roles in doing so under the framework of NCA method. The work is well-structured and the data analysis is reasonable. However, the following aspects should be addressed before its publishment:  1/ In section 3.3.1, the authors mentioned “we use the proportion of digital software and hardware investments to total assets to measure companies' real digital investment level”. Did they consider the expenditure on human resource related to digitalization in those companies? As some companies set in place a specific digitalization branch to fulfill the goal, there stands labor cost related to digitalization. What’s more, the authors used the frequency of “keywords” related to “digitalization” as a measurement. How did they make sure not missing or neglecting any “keywords”? 2/ At the end of Section 4.1, a summary or a table is suggested to show the result of verification of all hypothesis (maybe corresponding to Figure 1). 3/ In line 556, page 13, the authors presented that “…of enterprises must be increased to 25.8%, 1.3%, and 0.4%”, while, according to Table 3, the last two figures are given as 2.1% and 13.9% for pay gap and industrial digitalization level respectively, which should be checked in terms of consistency. 4/ A careful review of the manuscript is suggested as there are confusing expressions like “expense income “(line 382, page 9), “t in combination with 2”(line 477, page 11), and “’-NC+’ means that a low level of X is necessary for a high level of Y” occurs twice in Note 1 at the bottom of page 7. 5/ As this paper discussed the digital transformation of manufacturing companies, here three works are recommended to provide a glimpse of today’s digital orientation of manufacturing industries, where emerging methods are widely adopted throughout the lifespan of industrial products/ equipment: https://doi.org/10.1186/s10033-022-00760-x;  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijfatigue.2023.107917; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.engfracmech.2023.109630 Comments on the Quality of English Language

No

Author Response

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Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Authors, this study is mainly adequately presented.  The important area of digital transformation in manufacturing companies is addressed as a basis for successful operation in the competitive and vast market. Here are some comments and suggestions for improvement:

 Introduction:

Authors should highlight and define the purpose of the work according to current state of digital transformations in China and if possible to explain to whom the results are intended, mainly to researchers or also to company's management.

The introduction of AMO theory and NCA methodology in paragraphs 3 and 4 should be moved to the Section 3.1 Research Methodology.

Theoretical Background and Hypothesis:

In Hypothesis H5 is proposed that »High-level industry concentration (H5a) and  low-level  industry concentration (H5b) is necessary for the high-level digital transformation. Does that make sense?

Empirical Analysis:

The NCA software used in the analysis need to be shortly described and cited as it is available on the web.

L 327: Plots in Figure 3 are mentioned as part of the study, but it is not explained yet what they represent. This should be removed from this paragraph.

More information should be given about data used in the study, especially data from WIND and CSMAR databases need to be shortly described with added citations of web pages.

Data Analysis and Discussion:

Hypothesis H1, and H4 are included, but not tested - Why?

Hypothesis H2, and H3 are tested - were they verified or not?

Figure 3: a) Quality of graphs is not satisfactory, each scaterplot needs to be marked and cited with their variables description of NCA analysis.

 Minor comments:

L35: Accordingly cite this web page: https://www.accenture.cn/cn-zh/insights/strategy/china-digital-transformation-in- dex-2022)

L148: TMT - ?

Author Response

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Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper has been modified in the light of the comments.

Author Response

Thank you for reviewing the revisions to our manuscript. We appreciate your feedback and are glad to hear that the modifications made in response to your comments have been acknowledged.

Please let us know if there are any further adjustments or clarifications you believe are necessary. We are committed to improving the manuscript and value your expertise and guidance in this process.

Thank you once again for your constructive feedback and continued engagement with our work.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors have made changes according to my suggestions. Thus, I recommend for acceptance after minor revision.

1. Figure 3-5 are not clear, please replace them.

 

Author Response

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Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This manuscript has been soundly revised in response to previous comments. 

Author Response

Thank you for reviewing the revisions to our manuscript. We appreciate your feedback and are glad to hear that the modifications made in response to your comments have been acknowledged.

Please let us know if there are any further adjustments or clarifications you believe are necessary. We are committed to improving the manuscript and value your expertise and guidance in this process.

Thank you once again for your constructive feedback and continued engagement with our work.