Overseas R&D Activities And Home Productivity Growth: Evidence From Japanese Firm-Level Data

This paper investigates the impact of overseas subsidiaries' R&D (Research & Development) activities on the productivity growth of parent firms using-level panel data for Japanese multinational enterprises. This paper distinguishes between overseas R&D for the utilization and acquisition of foreign advanced knowledge, or innovation R&D, and overseas R&D for the adaptation of technologies and products to local conditions, or adaptive R&D. The major findings is that overseas innovative R&D helps to raise the productivity growth of the parent firm, while overseas adaptive R&D has no such effect.