Intelligent Manufacturing and Green Innovation—Evidence from China’s Listed Manufacturing Firms

The realization of intelligent and green manufacturing represents two core challenges currently faced by manufacturing enterprises. The “Intelligent Manufacturing Pilot Demonstration List” issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) of the People’s Republic of China provides a sample of firms that have undergone stringent selection processes, demonstrating secure and controllable technological capabilities, with no intellectual property disputes. Using data from manufacturing firms listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges from 2011 to 2020, we identify those that implemented intelligent manufacturing based on the aforementioned pilot list from 2015 to 2019 as the treatment group and the remaining firms as the control group to investigate whether intelligent manufacturing increases the number of green patent applications. The findings indicate that the implementation of intelligent manufacturing significantly increases green patent applications by 3.676% through three main pathways: reducing the level of financing constraints, improving resource utilization efficiency, and increasing R&D investment. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that state-owned enterprises exhibit a significantly stronger promotion effect on green innovation post-implementation of intelligent manufacturing compared to non-state-owned enterprises, with enterprises in the western region demonstrating the most pronounced enhancement in green innovation. Based on these findings, we propose corresponding recommendations from the perspectives of policy support and enterprise strategy.