Long abstract

About Statistics Publications & Documents Information by Country

The internationalisation of scientific and technological activities is not a new phenomenon in the process of economic globalisation. However, in recent years it has grown in scale. More particularly, the internationalisation of industrial R&D by multinational firms lies at the heart of these developments. The role and strategy of multinational firms in R&D raises new issues not only for the firms themselves but also for the policy makers responsible for developing their countries’ policies on research and innovation.

For a long time, some experts thought that, faced with international competition, enterprises would tend to keep a close watch on R&D activities and keep them as close as possible to their base in the country of origin. Others, however, considered that R&D activities were also likely to be included in the economic globalisation process and, consequently, likely also to spread across all the major markets in which international firms were established.

These divergent views were recently dissipated thanks to the new surveys organised by OECD member countries and co ordinated at international level by the OECD Secretariat, and by Eurostat at European level. The results of these surveys showed that industrial R&D is in fact becoming increasingly internationalised, and that over the last ten years it has become the most dynamic activity of multinational companies, just behind mergers/acquisitions and international investment.

For policy makers, it will be important first to identify all the forms of internationalisation of R&D, and then try to evaluate the possible impact of each form on their own country’s potential for innovation and technology. Until now, authorities in all countries have focused their attention essentially on research carried out within their borders. However, if one takes into account the different forms of internationalisation of R&D, several questions arise concerning the benefits attributed to each of these forms.

Firstly, it has been found that part of the R&D performed within a country’s borders may often be carried out by foreign firms on behalf of other enterprises or users located abroad. Conversely, firms located abroad may carry out research from which essentially domestic enterprises will benefit. A second question concerns the nature of the research carried out. Is it development work with the objective of adapting products to local markets, or is it research aimed at developing new technologies destined for global markets?

In this context, it will be important to be able, on the one hand, to assess how R&D laboratories of foreign affiliates contribute to the technological development of those countries and, on the other, what benefits are gained by the parent companies of those foreign-based affiliates, in the investing countries.

In the light of these considerations, it is becoming increasingly difficult for a country to provide a really precise definition of the idea of “national research effort” based on traditional statistics. The chief problem is the difficulty of evaluating precisely the role of multinational firms, whether domestic or foreign, when their R&D activities are developed and distributed across many countries around the world.

In this context, many questions arise, among which the following might be mentioned:
• What are the main forms of internationalisation of firms’ R&D?
• What is the extent of this internationalisation, and how is it likely to evolve?
• In which countries and regions do multinational firms locate their research laboratories?
• What are the main changes in where R&D is performed, and which sectors are concerned?
• What are the links between the internationalisation of production and of research?
• What are the factors that play a decisive role in the location of multinational firms’ R&D laboratories?
• What are the links between multinationals’ R&D activity and their commercial and direct investment strategy?
• What are the links between research activities, technology transfer, patenting and protection of intellectual property?
• What are the benefits that a country can draw from the internationalisation of R&D?
• What are the potential risks that may arise from such internationalisation?

This report can answer only a few of these questions, while priority will be given to setting out the facts and trends that emerge from the data available.