Knowledge Flows and R&D Strategies of Foreign Enterprises in Taiwan - A Social Capital Perspective

• Main Author: 何采穎
• Other Authors: 方世杰
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2003
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/77113959790564146191

碩士 === 義守大學 === 管理科學研究所 === 91 === The trend of MNE’s R&D investments in foreign countries can be seen as one of the most important subjects of its theoretical as well as practical field in recent years. It is straight forward to come to the conclusion that due to the technology globalization, MNE’s investments in the overseas R&D grew quickly. However, what are the determinant factors in selecting the locations of the MNE’s overseas R&D investment? This thesis, from the perspective of the host country, explores the linkage between the R&D strategies of the MNE''''''''s subsidiaries in Taiwan and its knowledge flow, organization learning capability of the subsidiaries. Additionally, the subsidiaries are embedded in two distinctly different networks, global as well as local networks. This thesis also intends to explore if the social capital, constructed by the global and local networks, has positive influence on the subsidiary’s knowledge flow, both in quality and quantity. The empirical results indicate that both global social capital and local social capital have positive, direct, impact on knowledge flows, especially local social capital have a stronger impact on knowledge flows. The results also indicate that the relationships with counterparts such as suppliers and customers in the host country are viewed as an important resource in MNE’s subsidiaries in Taiwan. Moreover, through the knowledge flow and organizational learning from the focused subsidiary to other MNE units, the focused subsidiary tends to have more active R&D strategies. Consequently, the performance of the focused subsidiary, as well as MNE as a whole, will be upgraded.