DuPont China: Sustaining Innovation

Dongyuan Wu; He Peng; Ziyan Li; Chunyi Zhang; Xiaolin Wang

Product #:FDC-25024-2X-CE_P

Supplier:School of Management at Fudan University

Discipline:Organizational Behaviour/Leadership

Setting:China, 2025

Details:Case (PDF) • 21 pages • 2025-06-17 (Rev: 2025-06-17)

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Since DuPont formally entered the Chinese market in 1988, its business model has shifted from product sales to providing localized solutions. In the face of a global economic slowdown, slower foundational innovation, and China’s intense competition and growing demand for highly customized technologies, how should DuPont China strengthen its local R&D capabilities to achieve sustainable growt

Learning Objectives

With a history of more than 200 years, DuPont has built deep technological capabilities and strong market influence across sectors such as chemicals, electronic materials, environmental technologies, and new energy. Since entering the Chinese market, DuPont has gradually evolved from a “Made in China” manufacturing base into a “Created in China” innovation center, exerting particular influence on application development and technological innovation in high-growth fields such as photovoltaics and new energy vehicles. By combining localized R&D teams with global resources, DuPont China has achieved faster market response and more customized product solutions, providing advanced technical support to customers in China and across the Asia-Pacific region. DuPont’s innovation practices offer instructive lessons for multinational corporations, especially those seeking to balance global integration with responsiveness to local market needs. For senior executives, DuPont’s experience demonstrates how firms quickly to changing local market demands by flexibly adjusting their strategic positioning and innovation processes, while maintaining the effective operation of a global innovation network. In addition, DuPont’s approach to talent development and management, cross-department collaboration, and its emphasis on failing fast and adjusting quickly all provide practical reference points for managers seeking to foster innovation and strengthen organizational resilience. This case is intended to help students understand how to manage innovation at the intersection of globalization and localization, and to master relevant innovation types, organizational innovation frameworks, and tools for strategic adjustment. By analyzing DuPont’s innovation practices in China, students will learn how firms coordinate technological R&D with market demand, manage global resources, and adapt to local markets, as well as how organizations sustain innovation through organizational structure, talent management, and incentive syst The case is suitable for undergraduate, MBA, and EMBA audiences, particularly in teaching contexts focused on organizational innovation mechanisms and multinational management practice. It can be widely used in courses such as organizational behavior, human resource management, business management, leadership, and entrepreneurship and innovation. Through analysis of DuPont’s localized innovation practices in China, the case helps students systematically grasp key issues such as cross-department collaboration, innovation incentives, organizational design, and global–local strategic fit, thereby strengthening their capacity for organizational analysis and strategic judgment in complex business environments. The specific teaching objectives are as follows: 1. Understand the alignment between innovation types and strategy—grasp the concepts of incremental and radical innovation and analyze their application under different strategic contexts. 2. Understand organizational innovation management frameworks—e McKinsey 7S framework and how it supports the implementation of innovation strategy. 3. Understand the coordination between technological R&D and market demand—learn Luo’s (2001) local responsiveness theory and analyze how DuPont adjusts its pace of innovation in a fast-changing market to meet market needs. 4. Examine how multinational enterprises innovate in local markets—analyze the implications for Chinese firms’ international expansion strategies and explore how innovation can be achieved in global

DuPont China: Sustaining Innovation

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Learning Objectives