Abstract: The endogenous service activities are the essence of the input of the manufacturing industry in services, however, the related researches on the input in services focus mainly on the input in the exogenous services, only few can be found on the endogenous service input. Taking the A-share listed companies of the manufacturing enterprises on Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges from 2007 to 2018 as the research objects, this paper investigates the characteristics of their endogenous service input, and empirically explores the impact of the endogenous service input on corporate performance. The results show that: (1) the proportion of the employees engaged in service activities in the total employees is increasing year by year, among which the proportion of the professional and technical personnel is the highest. At the same time, the strength of the endogenous services input is increasing, and the input intensity in the high-tech industries is generally higher than that in the low-tech industries. (2) The impact of the endogenous service input on corporate performance presents a U-shaped curve relationship. At present, most of the listed companies in the manufacturing industry are at the decline stage of the U-shaped curve, which need to further increase the intensity of the endogenous service input to reach the rising stage of the U-shaped curve, so as to achieve the goal of improving corporate performance. (3) The influence of the endogenous service input on corporate performance is heterogeneous, which depends on the characteristics of industry technology level, firm size and the types of ownership. The above empirical evidences can provide a feasible path for manufacturing enterprises to make service-oriented decisions and solve the problems of service-oriented dilemma from the perspective of the endogenous service input.

Key words: inputs in the endogenous services, corporate performance, servitization of the manufacturing industry, business function