IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pas/papers/2009-07.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Globalization of R&D by U.S-based Multinational Enterprises

Author

Listed:
  • Prema-chandra Athukorala
  • Archanun Kohpaiboonb

Abstract

This paper examines patterns and determinants of overseas R&D investment by US-based manufacturing MNEs using a new panel dataset over the period 1990-2004. The analysis reveals that R&D intensity of operation of US MNE affiliates is mainly determined by the domestic market size, overall R&D capability and cost of hiring R&D personnel. There is no evidence to suggest that financial incentives have a significant impact on inter-country differences in R&D intensity when controlled for other relevant variables. Overall, our findings cast doubts on the efficacy of efforts by host country governments entice MNEs affiliates to engage in domestic R&D in a global context where R&D is becoming a truly global activity.

Suggested Citation

  • Prema-chandra Athukorala & Archanun Kohpaiboonb, 2009. "Globalization of R&D by U.S-based Multinational Enterprises," Departmental Working Papers 2009-07, The Australian National University, Arndt-Corden Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:pas:papers:2009-07
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://crawford.anu.edu.au/acde/publications/publish/papers/wp2009/wp_econ_2009_07.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cohen, Wesley M. & Levin, Richard C., 1989. "Empirical studies of innovation and market structure," Handbook of Industrial Organization, in: R. Schmalensee & R. Willig (ed.), Handbook of Industrial Organization, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 18, pages 1059-1107, Elsevier.
    2. Pearce, Robert D., 1999. "Decentralised R&D and strategic competitiveness: globalised approaches to generation and use of technology in multinational enterprises (MNEs)," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(2-3), pages 157-178, March.
    3. Fors, Gunnar & Svensson, Roger, 1994. "R&D in Swedish Multinational Corporations," Working Paper Series 406, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    4. Feldstein, Martin & Hines, James R. & Hubbard, R. Glenn (ed.), 1995. "The Effects of Taxation on Multinational Corporations," National Bureau of Economic Research Books, University of Chicago Press, edition 1, number 9780226240954, October.
    5. Gene M. Grossman & Edwin L.-C. Lai, 2004. "International Protection of Intellectual Property," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(5), pages 1635-1653, December.
    6. Robert E. Lipsey & Robert C. Feenstra & Carl H. Hahn & George N. Hatsopoulos, 1999. "The Role of Foreign Direct Investment in International Capital Flows," NBER Chapters, in: International Capital Flows, pages 307-362, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Richard L. Daft & Robert H. Lengel, 1986. "Organizational Information Requirements, Media Richness and Structural Design," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 32(5), pages 554-571, May.
    8. James R. Hines, Jr., 1995. "Taxes, Technology Transfer, and the R&D Activities of Multinational Firms," NBER Chapters, in: The Effects of Taxation on Multinational Corporations, pages 225-252, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. repec:bla:scandj:v:92:y:1990:i:3:p:487-500 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Julian M Birkinshaw & Allen J Morrison, 1995. "Configurations of Strategy and Structure in Subsidiaries of Multinational Structure," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 26(4), pages 729-753, December.
    11. Mansfield, Edwin, 1986. "The R&D Tax Credit and Other Technology Policy Issues," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(2), pages 190-194, May.
    12. Gordon H. Hanson & Raymond J. Mataloni, Jr. & Matthew J. Slaughter, 2001. "Expansion Strategies of U.S. Multinational Firms," NBER Working Papers 8433, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Kumar, Nagesh, 1996. "Intellectual property protection, market orientation and location of overseas R&D activities by multinational enterprises," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 673-688, April.
    14. Park, Walter G., 2008. "International patent protection: 1960-2005," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 761-766, May.
    15. Cantwell, John & Piscitello, Lucia, 2002. "The location of technological activities of MNCs in European regions: The role of spillovers and local competencies," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 69-96.
    16. Keith E. Maskus, 2000. "Intellectual Property Rights in the Global Economy," Peterson Institute Press: All Books, Peterson Institute for International Economics, number 99.
    17. Odagiri, Hiroyuki & Yasuda, Hideto, 1996. "The determinants of overseas R&D by Japanese firms: an empirical study at the industry and company levels," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 25(7), pages 1059-1079, October.
    18. Kumar, Nagesh, 2001. "Determinants of location of overseas R&D activity of multinational enterprises: the case of US and Japanese corporations1," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 159-174, January.
    19. Richard C. Levin & Alvin K. Klevorick & Richard R. Nelson & Sidney G. Winter, 1987. "Appropriating the Returns from Industrial Research and Development," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 18(3, Specia), pages 783-832.
    20. Bloom, Nick & Griffith, Rachel & Van Reenen, John, 2002. "Do R&D tax credits work? Evidence from a panel of countries 1979-1997," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(1), pages 1-31, July.
    21. Ginarte, Juan C. & Park, Walter G., 1997. "Determinants of patent rights: A cross-national study," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 283-301, October.
    22. David Hummels, 2007. "Transportation Costs and International Trade in the Second Era of Globalization," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 21(3), pages 131-154, Summer.
    23. Hines, James R. (ed.), 2001. "International Taxation and Multinational Activity," National Bureau of Economic Research Books, University of Chicago Press, edition 1, number 9780226341736, October.
    24. Hirschey, Robert C & Caves, Richard E, 1981. "Research and Transfer of Technology by Multinational Enterprises," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 43(2), pages 115-130, May.
    25. Sanjaya Lall, 1985. "The International Allocation of Research Activity by US Multinationals," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Multinationals, Technology and Exports, chapter 3, pages 38-64, Palgrave Macmillan.
    26. Alan P. Kirman, 1992. "Whom or What Does the Representative Individual Represent?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 6(2), pages 117-136, Spring.
    27. James R. Hines, Jr. & James R. Hines Jr. & R. Glenn Hubbard, 1995. "Taxes, Technology Transfer, and R&D by Multinational Firms," NBER Chapters, in: Taxing Multinational Corporations, pages 51-62, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    28. Dunning, John H., 2000. "The eclectic paradigm as an envelope for economic and business theories of MNE activity," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 163-190, April.
    29. Jerry Sheehan & Andrew Wyckoff, 2003. "Targeting R&D: Economic and Policy Implications of Increasing R&D Spending," OECD Science, Technology and Industry Working Papers 2003/8, OECD Publishing.
    30. Martin Feldstein & James R. Hines Jr. & R. Glenn Hubbard, 1995. "The Effects of Taxation on Multinational Corporations," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number feld95-2, March.
    31. Barry, Frank, 2005. "FDI, transfer pricing and the measurement of R&D intensity," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(5), pages 673-681, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. René Belderbos, 2006. "R&D Activities in East Asia by Japanese, European, and US Multinationals," Microeconomics Working Papers 21887, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    2. Russell Thomson, 2009. "Tax Policy and the Globalisation of R&D," Departmental Working Papers 2009-03, The Australian National University, Arndt-Corden Department of Economics.
    3. Hall, Bronwyn H., 2011. "The internationalization of R&D," MERIT Working Papers 2011-049, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    4. Christof Ernst & Katharina Richter & Nadine Riedel, 2014. "Corporate taxation and the quality of research and development," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 21(4), pages 694-719, August.
    5. Desai, Mihir A. & Foley, C. Fritz & Hines, James Jr., 2004. "The costs of shared ownership: Evidence from international joint ventures," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 323-374, August.
    6. Knoll, Bodo & Riedel, Nadine & Schwab, Thomas & Todtenhaupt, Maximilian & Voget, Johannes, 2021. "Cross-border effects of R&D tax incentives," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(9).
    7. Marina Papanastassiou & Robert Pearce & Antonello Zanfei, 2020. "Changing perspectives on the internationalization of R&D and innovation by multinational enterprises: A review of the literature," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 51(4), pages 623-664, June.
    8. Mihir A. Desai & C. Fritz Foley & James R. Hines Jr., 2002. "International Joint Ventures and the Boundaries of the Firm," NBER Working Papers 9115, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Suma Athreye & Georgios Batsakis & Satwinder Singh, 2013. "Subsidiary Embeddedness is a Strategic Choice: Complementarity and the factors associated with different types of embeddedness," DRUID Working Papers 13-05, DRUID, Copenhagen Business School, Department of Industrial Economics and Strategy/Aalborg University, Department of Business Studies.
    10. Thomson, Russell, 2013. "National scientific capacity and R&D offshoring," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(2), pages 517-528.
    11. James R. Hines Jr., 2005. "Do Tax Havens Flourish?," NBER Chapters, in: Tax Policy and the Economy, Volume 19, pages 65-100, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Ming Liu & Sumner la Croix, 2013. "A Cross-Country Index of Intellectual Property Rights in Pharmaceutical Innovations," Working Papers 201313, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Department of Economics.
    13. Desai, Mihir A. & Foley, C. Fritz & Hines, James Jr., 2004. "Foreign direct investment in a world of multiple taxes," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(12), pages 2727-2744, December.
    14. Brown, James R. & Martinsson, Gustav & Petersen, Bruce C., 2017. "What promotes R&D? Comparative evidence from around the world," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 447-462.
    15. Desai, Mihir A. & Foley, C. Fritz & Hines, James Jr., 2006. "The demand for tax haven operations," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(3), pages 513-531, February.
    16. Mihir A. Desai & James R. Hines Jr., 2001. "Exchange Rates and Tax-Based Export Promotion," NBER Working Papers 8121, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Fors, Gunnar & Zejan, Mario, 1996. "Overseas R&D by Multinationals in foreign Centers of Excellence," SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance 111, Stockholm School of Economics.
    18. Lee Branstetter & Raymond Fisman & C. Fritz Foley, 2005. "Do Stronger Intellectual Property Rights Increase International Technology Transfer? Empirical Evidence from U.S. Firm-Level Data," NBER Working Papers 11516, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Lin, Jenny X. & Lincoln, William F., 2017. "Pirate's treasure," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 235-245.
    20. Patricia Laurens & Christian Le Bas & Antoine Schoen, 2019. "Worldwide IP coverage of patented inventions in large pharma firms: to what extent do the internationalisation of R&D and firm strategy matter?," Post-Print hal-01725229, HAL.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    R&D; multinational enterprises; foreign direct investment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F21 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Investment; Long-Term Capital Movements
    • O19 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - International Linkages to Development; Role of International Organizations
    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pas:papers:2009-07. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Prema-chandra Athukorala (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/asanuau.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.