Abstract
Because of the characteristics of high-tech industry, it’s not so easy to measure the R&D or innovation performance of the companies. There’s even no any appropriate tool to use. Although former experts had developed some models to measure companies’ performance, it still lacks of the studies about quantitative index. Thus, the research puts emphasis on reviewing the past tool used to measure the performance of high-tech start-up companies, and tries to develop a more appropriate and measurable tool based on the concept of Tobin’s q for measuring the performance. In this research, we get a quantitative index. In the practice, the companies can take the index as a performance measuring tool as long as they meet the following situations: companies which have high percentage of R&D expenditure, stand in the second or third stage of the business life cycle, and are not yet enter the stock market. It’s recommended that companies adapt the quantitative index accompany with other qualitative ones to make valuation more comprehensively. To enter the mature stage, the high-tech start-ups must take the R&D employees management in good condition, and make the resource input more efficient to create more revenue.