TY - JOUR
T1 - What determines overseas R&D activities? The case of Japanese multinational firms
AU - Shimizutani, Satoshi
AU - Todo, Yasuyuki
N1 - Funding Information:
This study was conducted as part of a project on industry and firm level productivity in Japan undertaken by Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI). The authors would like to thank RIETI for providing us the opportunity of conducting this research and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry for providing us valuable datasets. The authors are also grateful to René Belderbos, Kyoji Fukao, Ralph Paprzycki, and seminar participants at RIETI for helpful comments and suggestions. The authors also thank two anonymous referees for their comments that improved the quality of the paper. Financial support from the New Energy and Industrial Technology Organization is gratefully acknowledged. Todo is grateful to the Masayoshi Ohira Memorial Foundation for financial support. The opinions expressed in this paper are the sole responsibility of the authors.
PY - 2008/4
Y1 - 2008/4
N2 - This paper explores what factors determine the nature, extent, and location of Japanese multinationals' R&D activities abroad. Taking advantage of a rich micro-level dataset from the survey on Japanese overseas subsidiaries, the study distinguishes between two types of overseas R&D: basic/applied research and development/design. We find several differences between the determinants of those R&D activities. These differences confirm the view that basic/applied research of overseas subsidiaries aims at the exploitation of foreign advanced knowledge, whereas their development/design activities are mostly influenced by the market size of the host country. Our results provide a convincing and comprehensive explanation of the geographical distribution of overseas R&D by Japanese MNEs.
AB - This paper explores what factors determine the nature, extent, and location of Japanese multinationals' R&D activities abroad. Taking advantage of a rich micro-level dataset from the survey on Japanese overseas subsidiaries, the study distinguishes between two types of overseas R&D: basic/applied research and development/design. We find several differences between the determinants of those R&D activities. These differences confirm the view that basic/applied research of overseas subsidiaries aims at the exploitation of foreign advanced knowledge, whereas their development/design activities are mostly influenced by the market size of the host country. Our results provide a convincing and comprehensive explanation of the geographical distribution of overseas R&D by Japanese MNEs.
KW - Locational choice
KW - Multinational enterprises
KW - Multinomial logit estimation
KW - Overseas R&D activities
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U2 - 10.1016/j.respol.2007.11.010
DO - 10.1016/j.respol.2007.11.010
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:40649121473
SN - 0048-7333
VL - 37
SP - 530
EP - 544
JO - Research Policy
JF - Research Policy
IS - 3
ER -