Knowledge spillovers and the assignment of R&D responsibilities to foreign subsidiaries

Abstract

Research on R&D location choice by MNCs has focused largely on host country factor endowments and overlooked the role that the potential to capture and utilize knowledge spillovers from competitors may also play in determining such choices. Using a large‐scale panel database of the foreign subsidiaries of U.S.‐based MNCs in above‐average R&D‐intensive industries, we examine the extent to which external spillover opportunities as well as internal firm‐specific capabilities to utilize such knowledge affect MNCs' new R&D location decisions. Our findings suggest that MNCs appear to anticipate potential spillover opportunities and are discriminating in assessing these opportunities not only across locations but also across categories of competitors within the same location. Further, our findings provide stronger support to predictions regarding the salience of global utilization capacity than they do to predictions regarding the salience of local utilization capacity. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.