Internationale rivaliteit en technologie: als reuzen op een niet erg vlak speelveld spelen

Rob van Tulder sketches the uneven playing-field of global competition in the field of technology. Since the beginning of the 1980s, technology rivalrly, especially among multinational firms, has intensified. The number of multinational firms that dominate Research and Development (R&D) expenditures is relatively limited. There is an intriguing paradox that R&D investments are increasingly coordinated by multinationals at an international level, whilst the R&D process itself and the patenting of innovations is still locally embedded and concentrated in a small number of home economies. In most national innovation systems therefore, the ‘own' (home) multinationals predomine. In the particular case of the Netherlands a similar picture holds true, although host companies seem to make more use of the local R&D infrastructure than the largest home companies. For smaller countries it might be important to search for additional institutions internationally, in order to saveguard that the concentration of technological development will not jeopardize their competitive position.