• International Area Studies Review
• /
• v.15 no.2
• /
• pp.275-301
• /
• 2011

This study examines antecedent factors that influence subsidiaries' MNC (multinational corporation) knowledge adoption. I argue that subsidiary local environmental factors(local embeddedness, level of local competition), subsidiary organizational factors(parent investment, subsidiary CEO expatriation, scope of subsidiary value chain), and subsidiary relational factors(subsidiary autonomy, the strength of subsidiary in MNC, social capital) are the important enablers for subsidiaries to adopt knowledge from other MNC units. Especially, I use two data set (knowledge from (1) peer subsidiaries, (2) parent company) to estimate the effect of the factors. The results indicate that subsidiary local embeddedness and scope of subsidiary value chain negatively influence on subsidiary knowledge adoption from peer subsidiaries. Conversely, the strength of subsidiary in MNC and social capital positively influence on that. Subsidiary knowledge adoption from parent company is positively influenced by parent investment and social capital.

• The Southeast Asian review
• /
• v.23 no.3
• /
• pp.1-48
• /
• 2013

Taking the cases of Korean garment factories in Binh Duong area, this study aims to explain the phases and causes of the wildcat strikes that have rapidly expanded recently in Vietnam. For the purpose, this study raises several questions as follows. Why the strikes sometimes increase and decrease other times? Why the factory workers prefer a wildcat strike even though it is politically risky, unproductive, and complicated? By the same token, why the foreign management cannot or will not preemptively preclude the wildcat strikes that are usually predictable and the workers are mostly able to accomplish their demands? While answering these questions, this study explores the economic, political, and socio-cultural conditions of the wildcat strikes respectively. Based on the fieldwork in around 30 Korean owned garment factories and the interview with around 100 Vietnamese factory workers in Binh Duong, this study confirms several findings on the phases and causes of the strikes in the area in specific and in Vietnam in general. First, the annual trends of the wildcat strikes reflect the macroeconomic conditions in which the consumer prices and the labor market in Vietnamese economy and business conditions in the world economy are pivotal. Second, however, the influence of macroeconomic conditions on both the management and the workers in the garment factories are differential, depending on the financial situations of the multinational corporations and the workers' capability of reproducing their household economies. Thirdly, the possibility of the wildcat strike in each factory is relatively independent on the financial conditions of a factory and rather associated with the stable political structure and active political processes within the factory that enable the management and the workers to efficiently communicate each other. Lastly, the necessity of establishing political stability in a factory arises from the distinctive social and cultural characteristics of the multinational corporation in which foreign managers and native workers inevitably live in separate and different socio-cultural worlds.

• Korea Trade Review
• /
• v.43 no.2
• /
• pp.23-45
• /
• 2018

Logistic costs refer to trade costs, but it could influence FDI as well as global trade. Multinational corporations choose the geographic organization to produce their products. Therefore, it involves many countries to produce one product. International trade between countries more frequently involves the trade of raw materials, components, and unfinished goods. This implies that countries with better logistic performance are attractive for investment because of low transaction costs. Using the logistic performance index provided from the World Bank, this paper investigates the impacts of logistic performance on FDI inflow to developing countries. Results show that infrastructure and timeliness have a positive effects on FDI inflow to low income countries. In the case of middle income countries, timeliness has a negative effect on FDI inflow. This discrepancy between the low- and middle- income countries comes from the different motivation. FDI for low income countries primarily attempts to minimize labor costs. However, FDI for middle-income countries seems to be motivated to reduce labor costs and expand sales markets. FDI inflow in low-income countries serves as part of the offshoring or global outsourcing of multinational corporation.

• Journal of International Area Studies (JIAS)
• /
• v.14 no.1
• /
• pp.129-153
• /
• 2010

The guiding research question of this paper is to discover 'why the UK could not develop a general structure in which transnational corporations were born during the end of the 19th ~ beginning of the 20th century like other countries'. In response to this question, although acknowledging its imperfections, the author would like to explore the causality in the context of 'Social Construction' which is reflected in the attributes of British society. As such, researchers are strongly recommended to take into account the actors' interests and the increased value effect of events which is driven by control power. This paper concludes that: firstly, not only was contempt for industrial capitalism prevalent in British society, the British government was unable to recognize the necessity of promoting policies for the development of transnational corporation. In addition, the increase in the clout of commercial-financial capitalists in the city of London along with the expansion of gentlemanly elites interfered with the transnationality of British companies. Secondly, the foundation of the political and economic structures in the UK experienced continuity and challenge simultaneously. Since the 1850's, the British social structure has been progressively characterized by the strengthening power of the commercial-financial elites in London, which resulted not in the transnationality of manufacturing but that of financial services. Finally, the configuration of the social network driven by the British elites consists of the actors' interests and control power in association with severance and connection. Unlike the complementarity of interests, in the initial stage, intended connection based on voluntary motivation between gentries and commercial-financial elites occurred in terms of control power. However, ultimately, the holding of power was transferred to the commercial-financial elites excluding the industrial capitalists and resulted in the reconfiguration of the social network.

• Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
• /
• v.18 no.3
• /
• pp.243-266
• /
• 2015

This study does a case study of the electric-electronic cluster in Tamaulipas, Mexico. The purpose of this study is to investigate the development of industrial cluster in Mexico. The electric-electronics cluster in Tamaulipas, Mexico is MNC(Multinational Corporation) cluster. The number of MNC cluster increased after trade liberalization in Mexico. The result has demonstrated that the actual needs of maquila plants run by MNCs are the primary drivers for the formation and development of the cluster, which are related to education and human resource development. Overall, the electric-electronics cluster in Tamaulipas, Mexico is in its initial state, and the linkage between cluster members and local sectors such as Mexican suppliers is not strong. Finally, this study suggests the developmental ideas for the cluster.

• Journal of Distribution Science
• /
• v.13 no.8
• /
• pp.15-25
• /
• 2015

Purpose - There is a lack of research on how much corporate control is sufficient for effective subsidiary business-related decision making. To address this research gap, this study analyzes the impact of the level of control of a Korean corporation's headquarters on its overseas subsidiary performance. Research design, data, methodology - The study's sample comes from the Overseas Korean Business Directory of KOTRA. A multiple regression analysis empirically confirmed the relationship between the headquarters level of control over the subsidiaries and their performance. Results - The results show that the greater an organization's headquarters control over strategic issues, the greater the subsidiary's non-financial performance. However, quick decision-making through decentralization promotes the rapid selection of successful new products that can provide a competitive advantage. Conclusion - This study shows that the impact of control levels on subsidiary performance depends on the type of control involved. Specifically, while low levels of control over operational issues had a positive (+) influence on subsidiary non-financial performance, high control levels led to improved non-financial performance with regard to strategic issues among the subsidiaries.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
• /
• v.18 no.9
• /
• pp.854-862
• /
• 2012

The optimal design of batch-storage network by using periodic square wave model provides analytical lot sizing equations for a complex supply chain network characterized as multi-supplier, multi-product, multi-stage, non-serial, multi-customer, cyclic system including recycling and/or remanufacturing. The network structure includes multiple currency flows as well as material flows. The processes are represented by multiple feedstock/product materials with fixed composition which are very suitable for production processes. In this study, transportation processes that carry multiple materials with unknown composition are added and the time frame is changed from single period into multiple periods in order to represent nonperiodic parameter variations. The objective function of the optimization involves minimizing the opportunity costs of annualized capital investments and currency/material inventories minus the benefit to stockholders in the numeraire currency. The expressions for the Kuhn-Tucker conditions of the optimization problem are reduced to a multiperiod subproblem for average flow rates and analytical lot-sizing equations. The multiperiod lot sizing equations are different from single period ones. The effects of corporate income taxes, interest rates and exchange rates are incorporated.

• Journal of Korea Trade
• /
• v.25 no.1
• /
• pp.184-202
• /
• 2021

Purpose - This study empirically investigates the relationship between expatriate CEOs of multinational corporation (MNC) foreign subsidiaries and local philanthropy. Since corporate social responsibility (CSR) enables MNCs to achieve local legitimacy, this research argues that local philanthropy is a valuable strategic means for expatriate CEOs of foreign subsidiaries to secure local legitimacy. Design/methodology - To investigate our argument, we use a sample of 5,459 observations from 576 foreign subsidiaries of MNCs in Korea between 2002 and 2016. We conduct a random-effects panel Tobit regression with subsidiary CEO having foreign nationality as the independent variable and local philanthropy as the dependent variable. Findings - Our main findings are that expatriate CEOs of foreign subsidiaries are more actively engaged in local philanthropy. In addition, the positive relationship between expatriate CEOs and local philanthropy is weaker as their tenure increases. Originality/value - How expatriate CEOs overcome their weak local legitimacy as foreigners in a host country has remained unclear because existing studies mainly focused on the control and coordination aspects of staffing expatriates in CEO positions of foreign subsidiaries. This study broadens the literature on subsidiary CEO staffing and CSR activities of MNCs by identifying complementary relationships between expatriate CEOs and corporate philanthropy in the host country.

• Journal of East Asia Management
• /
• v.3 no.2
• /
• pp.1-19
• /
• 2022

This study suggests an integrated theoretical framework for the relationship between political risk and multinational corporation (MNC) subsidiary's performance in the emerging market. The political risk would have a negative impact on MNC subsidiary's performance in the emerging countries that are developing in Asia, the Commonwealth of Independent States, Africa, and South America. The major reason is that political risks could generate a loss of benefit or a loss of control for MNC's subsidiary. In this study, I suggest that corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy would be a solution to overcome various political risks. Specifically, the affiliated firms with diversified industries or greater financial resources could mitigate the negative impact of political risk than unaffiliated firms. Because they can use their tangible or nontangible asset such as information, technology, and construction in order to gain legitimacy and trust from local government, local community, and local firms in the emerging market. Finally, I claimed the costs of the affiliated firms would exceed the benefits at the initial stages, while the benefits of affiliated firms would exceed the costs over time when political risks become higher. The reason is that the trust gained from local stakeholders accumulates over time and the impact of CSR strategy would become an important solution to overcome the risks in and unstable context.

• Management & Information Systems Review
• /
• v.32 no.3
• /
• pp.25-41
• /
• 2013

This study was designed to suggest the effective CSR strategies for MNCs operating in Chinese market. For this purpose, it compares the multi-years results for the evaluation on CSR activities of Multinational and Chinese firms. It also conducts questionnaire survey in an attempt at developing measures of Chinese publics' perception on the four dimensions of CSR defined by Research Center of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences - responsibility management, economic responsibility, social responsibility, and environmental responsibility. The findings of empirical analyses indicate that the CSR activities of MNCs much fall in all four dimensions compared with them of Chinese firms. Among four dimensions, MNCs have had bad evaluations especially on economic responsibility and social responsibility that are considered more important than the others to Chinese. Those findings imply that the MNCs has so far failed to implement effective CSR activities in China. In order to offset their liabilities of foreignness and compensate for their disadvantages in the lack of governmental supports, MNCs should intensify the CSR in economic and social responsibilities.