The article explores how differences between partners in industry-university-research collaborations in China affect knowledge transfer performance. By studying 211 Chinese firms, the researchers found that when partners have different goals, it hinders the effectiveness of learning and absorptive capacity in transferring knowledge. Additionally, having too much or too little difference in technical knowledge weakens the impact of absorptive capacity on knowledge transfer performance. These findings help us understand how to improve sustainable knowledge transfer in innovation ecosystems.