For regions or nations which historically have had low levels of domestic R&D investment, such as Ireland, North and South, inward investment represents a potentially important source of inward knowledge transfer. Using data from large multi-national plants throughout Ireland this paper examines the geography of knowledge within Irish manufacturing, focussing particularly on knowledge gaps and knowledge transfer activity. The analysis suggests four main empirical results. First, no significant knowledge gaps exist between the Irish plants of multinational (MNE) companies and international best practice. Second, larger knowledge gaps exist between MNE plants and their best local suppliers suggesting the potential for local learning in the supply chain. Average knowledge gaps to suppliers also tend to be larger in the North. Third, there is no clear evidence that knowledge transfer activity is more intensive where knowledge gaps are widest. In particular, developmental interaction between MNE plants and suppliers tends to be more common in the South. Fourth, MNE plants indicated they had a larger impact on their suppliers in the South. These results suggest the potential benefit of policy measures both to increase knowledge transfer activity along the supply chain but also between companies which are not trading partners.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by Economic Research Institute of Northern Ireland in its series Working Papers NIERC. with number
72.
Find related papers by JEL classification: O31 - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth - - Technological Change - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives R12 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity; Interregional Trade (economic geography) R58 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - Regional Government Analysis - - - Regional Development Policy
References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
Zvi Griliches, 1998.
"The Search for R&D Spillovers,"
NBER Chapters,
in: R&D and Productivity: The Econometric Evidence, pages 251-268
National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
[Downloadable!]