浮沉
浮沉作者: 赖小琪
其实, 我不想再天真.
其实, 我不想再打开那扇门.
我只想让心房尘封,
管它是银楼, 还是金粉.
情感却在悄悄扎根,
伤痛在渐渐露痕.
寂寞梧桐, 庭院深深.
细月如钩锁清晨.
是秋愁, 还是春恨?
蓦然回首, 依旧风尘.
我一直在人海中浮沉.
Location of Overseas R&D
With the trend of globalization, there is a growing number of MNCs locating their R&D labs overseas due to great potential benefits they will bring about to MNCs. Recent evidence indicates that the process of locating R&D projects overseas has accelerated, and that the pattern and nature of internationalization of R&D has also changed (Atkinson, 2007; Lewin et al., 2009; Manning et al., 2008). Intra-organizational linkages in research and development (R&D) processes are recognized as an important aspect of many types of corporate innovation. In particular, following a series of results confirming the existence of localized knowledge spillover effects (Jaffe et al., 1993; Audretsch and Feldman, 1996), much attention has been given to functional regions as arenas for knowledge flows. By setting up overseas R&D labs, MNCs can achieve various purposes as to develop the latest technologies, advance management skills, etc.
After determining to locate R&D labs overseas, MNCs need to consider the location of them. Researchers have observed that MNCs in the same industries tend to locate their international R&D activities in close geographic proximity (e.g., Silicon Valley and Route 128). In the theoretical economics literature, it is often assumed that firms in the same industries cluster their R&D activities because of agglomeration economies (Krugman, 1991). Because firms cannot fully appropriate the benefits of their own R&D, positive externalities in the form of human capital or infrastructure development and knowledge leakages provide incentives for other firms to locate R&D nearby(Susan Feinberg, 2000). Another pattern of firm behavior consistent with the observed clustering of R&D is one in which past R&D decisions by other firms have no causal connection with current R&D location choices. Rather, firms (MNCs) simply have different preferences over R&D locations for exogenous reasons. These reasons are unrelated to past R&D decisions of other firms and could include many plausible explanations such as national factor endowments (e.g., research universities or endowments of minerals, petroleum, or other critical production inputs which make local R&D more attractive) or government subsidies and tax breaks aimed at developing particular industries (Susan Feinberg, 2000). In the context of overseas R&D, the MNC will (re)locate some part of its R&D operations to different geographical locations according to the capabilities and resources in the focal location (Susan Feinberg, 2000).
Although there are huge amount of examinations on the locations of overseas R&D labs in the prior literatures, they mainly focus on studying the relationship between the nature of MNCs and overseas R&D locations or between the host countries’ conditions and overseas R&D locations. Little study has been done on the relationship between motives of overseas R&D and its location. When choosing R&D locations, MNCs have to take into account “what the overseas R&D is going to do”. That is the motive of R&D. By knowing clearly the motive of R&D, MNCs can make a better decision of R&D’s location to achieve its purpose and strategy. Also the past literature seldom studies the effect of local market size in host country on MNCs’ choice of R&D locations. Moreover, MNCs in developed countries may show a different affection for R&D locations from those in developing countries.
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