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Purpose – To explore the influence of autonomy on subsidiaries' development and transfer intensities and their interrelationship.

Methodology/approach – We develop a theoretical model that we test on a sample of 85 innovation projects developed in 63 subsidiaries in 14 countries. The data were collected by personal interviews and analysed using the Partial Least Squares technique.

Findings – Autonomy is an important driver of subsidiaries' innovation intensity although, surprisingly, we find no influence on transfer intensity. We confirm the positive relationship between subsidiary innovativeness and its role as provider of new competence to sister units within the multinational enterprise (MNE).

Research limitations/implications – In line with previous studies, we can say that autonomy is a desirable result of subsidiary evolution. We can also suggest that overall subsidiary autonomy is beneficial not just to the subsidiary but to the rest of the MNE, since the more the subsidiary innovates the more related competence will be transferred. In other words, innovation efforts at subsidiary level are critical to sustain MNEs' overall competitive advantage.

Practical implications – First, it seems that the more a subsidiary's innovativeness is fostered, the more transfers to other units will occur. Second, we have seen how autonomy is beneficial to the innovative activity of the subsidiary and that it does not seem to harm transfer intensity.

Originality/value – Following studies that point out the potential trade-off between the output of development and transfer activities by subsidiaries, our research contributes by empirically testing the relationship between the intensities of subsidiary innovation development and transfer.

This chapter provides an empirical investigation into the process by which subsidiaries in multinational firms add capabilities in a given line of business. We describe the process of subsidiary capability development as a non-recursive relationship between the parent's transfer of decision-making power and capability development, which then affects subsidiary performance. The empirical results from survey data confirm such mutually reinforcing mechanisms and highlight the importance of both external and internal forces that facilitate or impede the developmental process.

Purpose – The chapter aims at enhancing our understanding on how the headquarters involvement and subsidiary entrepreneurship during the innovation development process of multinational corporation (MNC) subsidiaries affect the outcome of the innovation in terms of their home market- and organisational performance.

Design/methodology/approach – The study is based on cross-sectional questionnaire survey data from 87 innovation projects in 64 MNC subsidiaries located in Europe, East Asia and the United States.

Findings – Subsidiary entrepreneurship during the innovation process has a positive impact on the subsidiary's market performance and a negative impact on its organisational performance, whereas the involvement of corporate headquarters has a negative impact on the market performance, and a positive impact on the organisational performance.

Research implications – The research provides a starting point for further research on the relationship between the management of innovation processes among MNC subsidiaries and the performance outcomes of such processes.

Practical implications – The study implies that there is a need for corporate managers to take into account the entrepreneurial endeavour of subsidiaries when formulating corporate innovation strategies.

Originality/value: Integrates a top-down and bottom-up perspective on the strategic management of innovation development processes in MNC subsidiaries.

Purpose – This research aims to understand inter-subsidiary innovation transfers from a subsidiary business network perspective. We examine transfer performance with particular interest in the influence of subsidiary business networks in innovation development stage. The moderating effect of knowledge inputs, that is, external and internal business partners, on transfer efficiency and effectiveness are hypothesized.

Methodology/approach – This study utilizes the data of 129 inter-subsidiary transfer projects from 19 multinational corporations. The empirical analysis specifically examines how and to what extent the development partnership – source of knowledge inputs – affects the efficiency and effectiveness of innovation transfer between subsidiaries.

Findings – The results indicate that the source of knowledge inputs influence transfer performance indirectly, but not directly. The impact is made through the dyadic relationship to the transfer performance. The findings complement the literature on innovation/knowledge transfer by incorporating innovation development into scrutiny and gauging transfer efficiency and effectiveness explicitly.

Value of paper – The empirical evidence highlights the significance of dyadic willingness to both transfer efficiency and effectiveness. Its influence to transfer performance exceeds that of dyadic similarity or previous collaboration experience. The result provides useful managerial implications to MNCs headquarters and subsidiaries. The lack of previous collaboration experience or technical similarity may pose the down side for innovation transfer between subsidiaries. But that should not put off the initiatives to conduct innovation transfers. Such problem could be effectively remedied by strong willingness between the dyad. The resources and support that subsidiaries receive could counteract the hurdle of dissimilarity and unfamiliarity.

Increased global competition originating from both within the multinational corporation (MNC) and from global adversaries dictates that subsidiaries must be responsive to change, adaptable, and capable of sensing and seizing new opportunities for capability development and growth. For many subsidiaries adhering to, or being seen to adhere to, the wider organizational goals dictated by their parent represents an additional complexity. While it may be necessary to divert slack resources towards capability development, subsidiaries which do so, on their own initiative, may well run the risk of being categorized as an unruly node in the MNC’s network. Further, by failing to show compliance with organizational strategy future subsidiary-driven efforts may be curbed or prohibited.

The need to demonstrate value to the MNC through developing new and novel capabilities while complying with parent-driven strategy thus represents a key subsidiary dilemma, yet remains an underexplored phenomenon in international business research. Framing this dilemma via an ambidexterity lens, our chapter explores how five subsidiary units balance and negotiate allegiances within a modern MNC context. We find that in the subsidiary context aligning and adapting may not be competing or exclusive strategies, but in effect two sides of the same coin. The structural context can shape relative levels of alignment via controlling mechanisms and monitoring of operations while the subsidiary’s behavioral context, idiosyncratic to the subsidiary, can dictate its capacity to generate initiatives and to create new and novel capabilities for diffusion across the MNC network.

Purpose – The purpose of this conceptual chapter is to discuss the limitations of the network organization in multinational corporations (MNCs). Since many IB/IM publications concentrate on the advantages of this organizational form, the focus of the chapter is on identifying the limitations that MNCs need to be aware of when they use network organizations.

Methodology – The analysis is based on a sound review of the literature that refers to the network organization in general and its application in MNCs.

Findings – The chapter shows that MNCs present a context that can aggravate the problems of a network organization. Four types of problems are identified: (1) knowledge transfer between MNCs’ subunits, (2) trust-building and corporate culture within MNCs, (3) subsidiary development and subsidiary managers’ stress, and (4) additional problems of a more general nature.

Practical implications – As a result of these problems, it is expected that the formal, hierarchical structure will remain an important organizational instrument for MNCs. The chapter specifies in which ways the formal organizational structure can help to reduce the limitations of the network organization. Finally, the chapter argues that, among the formal organizational models, the matrix structure should be considered more intensively in the future.

Originality/value of chapter – Since existing discussion of the network organization in MNCs tends to ignore the limitations and downsides of this organizational form, the chapter contributes to a more balanced understanding of the network organization.

The purpose of this chapter is to develop a framework that can be used to study the impact of multinational enterprises (MNEs) on sustainable development and poverty alleviation in developing countries. In the 3-year project awarded by the EC-FP7 program, six universities from Europe and three partners from developing countries participated: Brazil, Ghana, and India. For this purpose, a thorough literature review is done and a framework is presented. To confirm the conceptual framework, we performed several case studies with three MNEs in two countries, Ghana and India. Data collection was done through qualitative in-depth interviews with managers in the headquarters of MNEs, the subsidiaries, and the “linked” local firms and host governments. Results confirm our conceptual model that the autonomy of the subsidiary, strategies of MNEs, and local government policies play a major role in achieving positive externalities from MNE operations in developing countries. The key contribution of this study is the development of a relevant conceptual framework that can be used in the overall project. Our study confirms that an interaction between the MNE subsidiary and the local government is essential for the linkages and spillovers to occur that may benefit local economic development and poverty reduction in developing countries.

Purpose – The purpose of this chapter is to analyse the evolution in the local, global and multinational network embeddedness of foreign subsidiaries in China

Methodology – The study focuses on Sino-Belgian subsidiaries in China. Factor analysis was used to determine the local responsiveness, global integration and multinational network embeddedness of firms. Next cluster analysis was carried out to classify groups of subsidiaries, while ANOVA analysis assessed their different characteristics.

Findings – Although most firms remain the same type of subsidiary throughout the period of 1995–2005, the most prevalent trajectory of strategic evolution by multinational subsidiaries in China is by increasing the integration in the multinational network before gaining more local embeddedness towards a more active role within the multinational network.

Research implications – Changes in the strategic setting and operations of MNEs occur over time because of the dynamic patterns and changing interactions of firm- and country-related factors and policies, especially when the host economy is involved in a rapid transformation process, such as China. Further research could focus on the determinants of strategic evolution.

Originality – This is one of the first chapters to analyse the changing roles of subsidiaries, in particular in an emerging economy.

The role of HQ in the contemporary MNC has recently received a good deal of research attention. This article argues that the contemporary MNC requires an organizational model that can embrace different perspectives of the HQ role. The same HQ must at times hierarchically lead the firm and at other times assume a more passive, facilitative role that allows direct interaction and decision making among the subunits to coordinate interdependency within the firm. To achieve this integration, the article proposes a contingency model that specifies when the HQ should assume a hierarchical role and when it should assume a facilitative role.

The article develops a model which conceptualizes headquarter-subsidiary relations in the multinational corporation as a multilevel discursive struggle between key managers. At the first level, the relations are conceptualized as a discursive struggle over decisions and actions using rationalistic discourses. At the second level, they are viewed as a discursive struggle over power relations using control and autonomy discourses. Finally, underlying the first two, at the third level, headquarter-subsidiary relations are conceptualized as a discursive struggle over managers’ worldviews using cultural (pre)conceptions about “the self” and “the other.”