Collaboration in innovation between foreign subsidiaries and local universities: evidence from Spain

Abstract

Collaboration between foreign subsidiaries and universities is relevant for multinational companies that aim at absorbing knowledge from abroad, as well as for universities and policy makers attempting to maximize the spillovers associated with FDI. We explore how multinational companies collaborate with universities in the foreign countries where they locate and provide new empirical evidence for Spain as a host country. Using a probit model with panel data comprising 9 614 firms for the period 2005-2011, we examine differences between the propensity to collaborate with universities of foreign subsidiaries and Spanish firms. Subsequently, building on a new survey to 89 foreign subsidiaries and on a more detailed analysis of five case studies, we discuss the variety of motivations that drive collaboration with universities and relate the scale and scope of such collaborations with the dynamic mandates of foreign subsidiaries in global innovation networks.