The evolution of technology in multinational enterprises: the role of creative subsidiaries

Robert Pearce

International Business Review, 1999, vol. 8, issue 2, 125-148

Abstract: The paper deals with the positioning of dispersed technology acquisition and application in heterarchical MNEs. It suggests that as MNEs acknowledge the need to respond to technological and market heterogeneity, this is best done through creative subsidiaries that access and apply localised dimensions of knowledge. Ultimately the most successful results of this, for the creative subsidiary and its MNE corporate group, are likely to be achieved if exercised as new perspectives within the current technological trajectory of the MNE. New technological dimensions emerging in creative subsidiaries can usefully be allowed to challenge the limits of the group's technology trajectory, but not to usurp it in a disorderly fashion. The aims of central technology management in this type of MNE are, therefore, to retain effective custodianship of a coherent and cohesive technology trajectory, without stifling the ability of creative subsidiaries to generate and apply new knowledge.

Keywords: Multinationals; Technology; R&D; Mandate; subsidiaries; Heterarchies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1999
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (48)

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