Because of the radical novelty of emerging technologies, investing in such technologies brings high risk and great uncertainty. Whether investors’ experiential knowledge encourages or discourages investment in emerging technologies remains under investigation. Juxtaposing the “absorptive capacity” and “competency trap” perspectives, this study proposes a pair of competing hypotheses regarding the influence of experiential knowledge on investor decision-making in emerging technologies. Specifically, we contend that experiential knowledge stimulates investment in emerging technologies based on the absorptive capacity perspective. Meanwhile, drawing on the competency trap perspective, we also argue that experiential knowledge may discourage investment in emerging technologies. Empirical evidence from blockchain-related funding rounds reveals that experiential knowledge negatively influences investment in emerging technologies, which is consistent with the competency trap perspective. We also discover that investor reputation and investor status exacerbate the competency trap implications. Overall, this study sheds light on investment in emerging technologies, the theoretical dilemma of experiential learning, as well as decision-making under uncertainty and ambiguity.

中文翻译：

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吸收能力与能力陷阱：新兴技术的经验知识和投资

由于新兴技术的新颖性，投资此类技术会带来高风险和巨大的不确定性。投资者的经验知识是否会鼓励或阻碍对新兴技术的投资仍有待调查。将“吸收能力”和“能力陷阱”的观点并列，本研究提出了关于经验知识对新兴技术投资者决策的影响的两个相互竞争的假设。具体来说，我们认为，从吸收能力的角度来看，经验知识会刺激对新兴技术的投资。同时，从能力陷阱的角度来看，我们还认为经验知识可能会阻碍对新兴技术的投资。区块链相关融资轮次的经验证据表明，经验知识会对新兴技术的投资产生负面影响，这与能力陷阱的观点是一致的。我们还发现，投资者声誉和投资者地位加剧了能力陷阱的影响。总体而言，这项研究揭示了新兴技术的投资、体验式学习的理论困境以及不确定性和模糊性下的决策。