Huiping Li

The study focuses on the benefit of foreign direct investment (FDI) at the firm level. Looking into the way businesses acquire institutional knowledge, the study examines whether IJVs have built local technological capability through acquiring and then using the international resources and knowledge of the foreign joint venture partners, and if so, the level of the technological capability that they have been able to develop as a result. This study also examines how the technological capability is accumulated, by studying integration mechanisms of the joint venture, in particular, the joint venture's relationship with its foreign parent, and with the foreign parent’s affiliates. In this way I identify the mechanisms IJVs employ to build local technological capability and the determinants of the rate at which they are able to build such capability.