Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 1.5
(continued)
Rank
2009
GSI
b
Financial
TNCs
Home
economy
Affiliates
Total
Number
of foreign
affiliates
I.I.
c
Number
of host
countries
19
47.0
Natixis
France
217
137
63.1
35
20
46.4
Nomura
Holdings Inc
Japan
104
86
82.7
26
Source:
UNCTAD/HEC Montréal.
a
Data on affiliates is based on the Dun and Bradstreet 'Who owns Whom'
database.
b
GSI, the “Geographical Spread Index”, is calculated as the square root of the
internationalization index multiplied by the number of host countries.
c
II, the “Internationalization Index”, is calculated as the number of foreign
affiliates divided by the number of all affiliates.
developing countries into other developing countries is growing
quickly, by far the most popular location for the affiliates of the top
one hundred MNEs from developing and transition countries is
the UK, followed by the US (UNCTAD 2007). These two econo-
mies account for more than twice the number of affiliates of these
developing economies' MNEs than any other country.
from mere 'vehicle' of technical knowledge to 'creator' of new technology
(e.g., Cantwell 1994; Cantwell and Iammarino 2003). MNEs are today
the largest source of technology generation, transfer and diffusion in the
world. In comparison with all other firm types, the share of new tech-
nologies produced globally by MNEs is increasing; they are associated
with a higher probability of entry into new and more distantly related
technological fields; they account for the great bulk of expenditure on
knowledge-creating and skill-enhancing activities, and of trade in technol-
ogy and technology-intensive products (UNCTAD 2009). MNEs' access
to a broad variety of sources of new knowledge, both intra- and inter-firm,
provides massive opportunities to acquire new competitive advantages
and their internal and external sources of knowledge and information
have obvious geographical manifestations.
Recent years have also seen economics direct new attention to the phe-
nomena of spatial concentration, and one result has been an increasing
body of evidence of the spatially bounded character of knowledge crea-
