Turning green hydrogen into firms’ decarbonization strategies: opportunities, challenges, and implications for China

Increasing R&D investments in green hydrogen promise to shape the global energy value chain and transform the nature of energy markets and industries, and the way firms organize their operations, as well as how and where they compete. China is emerging as the most competitive market in green hydrogen since it holds a huge number of family patents in this area while investing massively in hydrogen production. However, capturing value from these R&D investments requires Chinese companies to undergo transformations and effective commercialization, raising a series of questions prompting them to rethink their global strategies and capabilities. These changes will have critical implications for strategic management and international business research. In this article, we propose a conceptual framework that provides a strategic view of green hydrogen technology, including managerial processes and capabilities that support Chinese companies in exploiting green hydrogen innovations and their impact on regional clusters and international collaboration. We also discuss what firms’ capabilities are crucial to deploy effectively green hydrogen technologies in terms of costs, resilience and risks. We elucidate how this new energy landscape shapes the extant strategic management and international business literature and how future research can push it further along.