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Large Firms in the Production of the World's Technology: An Important Case of “Non-Globalisation”

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Abstract

US patenting by 686 of the world's largest manufacturing firms shows that their share of the world's production of technology is less than their share of R&D activities, and varies greatly amongst sectors. In most cases, the technological activities of these large firms are concentrated in their home country, the characteristics of which influence the volume and trends in their technological activities much more strongly then the international component of these activities. At the same time, these large firms are major elements in the volume and the pattern of sectoral specializations in their home countries' technological activities.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Sussex,

    Pari Patel & Keith Pavitt

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  1. Pari Patel
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  2. Keith Pavitt
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*Pari Patel is an economist with previous experience in macroeconomic modelling at City University Business School, London. His earlier work at the Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU) at the University of Sussex was on technology and employment. His current work is on science, technology and energy policy in British economic development.

**Keith Pavitt read engineering and industrial management at Cambridge, and economics and public policy at Harvard. He was a staff member in the Directorate for Scientific Affairs at the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), and a Visiting Lecturer at Princeton, before becoming a Senior Fellow at SPRU, and Professor in the University of Sussex. He has published numerous papers and books on the implications for management and policy of technological innovation. He is now Deputy Director of SPRU.

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Patel, P., Pavitt, K. Large Firms in the Production of the World's Technology: An Important Case of “Non-Globalisation”. J Int Bus Stud 22, 1–21 (1991). https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.jibs.8490289

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.jibs.8490289

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