Abstract: With the requirements of the Chinese path to modernization and the goal of building a world scientific and technological power, the routines reconfiguration has become the key mechanism to build sustainable competitive advantage to catch up. In order to uncover the strategic choice dilemma of ‘to be different, or to be the same’ in the face of the leading firms’ exemplar-based routines, it finds that network organizations have multiple distinctiveness needs of network configuration and knowledge base with the leading firms. The continuous balance of optimal distinctiveness is the basis of innovation catch-up and leapfrog. Not only the optimal distinctiveness strategies of imitation isomorphism, integrative orchestration and compensatory orchestration but also the network stability/disturbance and external search/reuse promote the process of network routines iterative reconstruction in digital context based on the role of reconstruction. Digitalization intensifies the need for reshaping of network routines for organization. The routines iterative reconfiguration support for the construction of digital agility capability and digital collaboration capability, and drives the evolution process of them. Digital capabilities promote the realization of progressive and leapfrog for catch-up goals, which not only rely on the continuous upgrading of leading products and the controllable innovation of core technologies, but also need to break through the opportunity windows and asymmetric relationships. This study constructs the theoretical framework of ‘optimal distinctiveness strategy - routines reconfiguration – digital capability - catch-up and leapfrog’ based on the view of optimal distinctiveness. The research conclusions are of great significance for Chinese enterprises to benchmark world-class enterprises and achieve catch-up.