In response to the demand for carbon emission reduction, enterprises engage in green technology innovation. Technical collaboration between rival companies has emerged as a strategy to lower the costs of green innovation, reduce uncertainties and risks, and meet market demands by accelerating the introduction of new products. This paper establishes three game models based on the different cooperation contracts of the heterogeneous brand firms: the non-cooperative model, the innovation cost-sharing contract model, and the technology licensing contract model. Comprehensive analysis shows that competing firms intend to cooperate based on reducing green innovation costs and producing products with higher green levels to meet the market. Although cooperation between competing firms is beneficial for the profit gaining of both firms, the cooperation does not necessarily lead to an increase in the green level of products. Comparing with the cost-sharing contract, although technology licensing may highlight the brand disadvantage of the emerging enterprise under significant disparity in brand differentiation, the emerging enterprise can still benefit from increased sales generated by the dominant enterprise and achieve higher gains. Furthermore, competing firms can achieve a win-win-win situation in terms of profit, environment, and social welfare through both cost-sharing contract and technology licensing contract under certain circumstances.

中文翻译：

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合作还是不合作？竞争制造商可持续发展绿色创新战略分析

企业响应碳减排需求，开展绿色技术创新。竞争对手公司之间的技术合作已成为降低绿色创新成本、减少不确定性和风险并通过加快新产品推出来满足市场需求的战略。基于异质品牌企业不同的合作契约，本文建立了三种博弈模型：非合作模型、创新成本分摊契约模型和技术许可契约模型。综合分析表明，竞争企业倾向于以降低绿色创新成本、生产更高绿色水平的产品来满足市场为基础进行合作。尽管竞争企业之间的合作有利于双方获得利润，但合作并不一定会导致产品绿色水平的提高。与成本分摊合同相比，虽然在品牌差异化悬殊的情况下，技术许可可能凸显新兴企业的品牌劣势，但新兴企业仍然可以从优势企业带来的销售额增加中获益，获得更高的收益。此外，在一定情况下，竞争企业可以通过成本分摊契约和技术许可契约在利润、环境和社会福利方面实现三赢。