Abstract: The breakthrough development of information technology during the last half century set off another wave of technological revolution and announced the coming of the age of information and telecommunication. As countries in the world competing to develop information technology and promoting informatization construction, China has been vigorously promoting the informatization of the national economy and society and made the integration of informatization and industrialization an important national strategy. Does informatization construction really bring better performance to Chinese micro firms? Through which channel informatization construction could help firm achieve better development? An analysis framework of informatization construction-information sharing-firm performance is established and the influence mechanism of informatization construction on firm performance is discussed in this study. It is claimed that firm's informatization construction can bring better firm performance by promoting communication between firms up and down the supply chain. It is shown that investment in information equipment construction and website building of firms can facilitate information sharing between those and their upstream and downstream firms on demand, inventory and production and provide firm performance improvement through sharing those valuable information in an empirical study using a survey data of Chinese manufacturing firms collected by The World Bank. It is indicated that informatization construction make the support of information sharing about firm business and promotion on firm performance more significantly in further analysis of this paper.
The important effect of informatization construction on enhancing communication, relieving information asymmetry and promoting economic growth are indicated and the importance and necessity of China vigorously supporting and developing information technology and actively advancing the integration of informatization and industrialization are implied from the perspective of micro firms in this study. For firms, informatization is not only a kind of new supervisor mode, production mode or sales mode, on the basis of information transfer, it will also promote benign interaction between firms on supply chain level and provide better access to information, more accurate production and operation decisions and higher value for firms.

Key words: informatization construction, supply chain, information sharing, firm performance