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Technological Catch-up to the National and Regional Frontier: Firm-level Evidence for India

Author

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  • Shubin Yang
  • Sandra Lancheros
  • Chris Milner

Abstract

This paper studies productivity convergence to the regional and national frontiers among manufacturing firms in India, using panel data over the period 1999 to 2010. We find evidence that lagging firms converge to their national and regional frontiers, with faster speed of convergence to the national frontier than to their regional frontier. We extend our analysis to explore how firms’ participation in foreign markets (through exporting and investing abroad) affects the process of convergence. Our results suggest a ranking of firms’ speed of convergence based on their level of international engagement through exports, with non-exporters converging faster to their technological frontiers, followed by non-continuous exporters, and finally by continuous exporters. These results suggest that more established exporters are closer to the technological frontier and therefore have less scope to catch up than their less persistent counterparts and non-exporting firms. However, we did not find significant differences in the speed of convergence amongst exporting firms that have moved to the next stage of globalisation by investing abroad.

Suggested Citation

  • Shubin Yang & Sandra Lancheros & Chris Milner, 2021. "Technological Catch-up to the National and Regional Frontier: Firm-level Evidence for India," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 57(8), pages 1303-1320, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:jdevst:v:57:y:2021:i:8:p:1303-1320
    DOI: 10.1080/00220388.2021.1881492
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    Cited by:

    1. Lu Xu & Jie Xiong & Jie Yan & Richard Soparnot & Zhe Yuan, 2023. "Technological Uncertainty and Catch-Up Patterns: Insights of Four Chinese Manufacturing Sectors," Post-Print hal-04011634, HAL.
    2. Ndubuisi, Gideon & Denis, Yuni & Urom, Christian & Abid, Ilyes, 2023. "Too big to be ignored: How energy poverty undermines productive efficiency," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 181(C).
    3. Lu Xu & Jie Xiong & Jie Yan & Richard Soparnot & Zhe Yuan, 2023. "Technological Uncertainty and Catch-Up Patterns: Insights of Four Chinese Manufacturing Sectors," Grenoble Ecole de Management (Post-Print) hal-04011634, HAL.
    4. Sun, Qingyu & Li, Chuandong & Ma, Xiaowei, 2025. "Regional equity in the energy transition: Assessing the role of productivity gaps and technology selection," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).
    5. Gideon Ndubuisi & Solomon Owusu, 2023. "Trade for catch-up: examining how global value chains participation affects productive efficiency," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 59(2), pages 195-215, April.
    6. Majidpour, Mehdi & Saber, Ali & Elahi, Shaban & Shayan, Ali & Sahebkar Khorasani, Seyed Mohammad, 2021. "Technological catch-up in the biopharmaceutical sector: Evidence from Iran," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    7. Amrita Saha & Vikrant Shirodkar & Thomas C. Lawton, 2023. "Bimodal lobbying and trade policy outcomes: Evidence from corporate political activity under uncertainty in India," Journal of International Business Policy, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 6(1), pages 24-46, March.

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