Mixed Ownership Reform of State-Owned Enterprises and R&D Investment

State-owned enterprise (SOE) reforms may play a vital role in R&D investment. This paper investigates the impact of mixed ownership reform of SOEs in China on R&D investment. Using a large sample of Chinese SOEs for the 2009–2018 period, we find that the reform has a positive effect on R&D investment. The result is robust to a battery of robustness tests and more prominent for firms with non-state-owned large shareholders holding more shares relative to state-owned large shareholders, and for firms with less stress from local officials pursuing political promotion. Furthermore, we find that to compensate for the adverse impact of R&D on the political promotion of the CEO, non-state-owned large shareholders allow the CEO to increase perk consumption. Our study suggests that the ongoing mixed ownership reform in China improves the SOEs’ efficiency.