How Firms Build Isolating Mechanisms for Knowledge: A Study in Offshore Research and Development Captives

Autor: Deepa Mani, Prashant Kale, Anand Nandkumar, Kannan Srikanth
Rok vydání: 2020
Předmět:
Zdroj: Strategy Science. 5:98-116
ISSN: 2333-2077
2333-2050
DOI: 10.1287/stsc.2020.0101
Popis: Understanding how firms protect their knowledge from leakage is becoming increasingly important, especially when knowledge is not well protected by legal mechanisms such as patents. The rapid rise in research and development (R&D) activities taking place in offshore locations that only offer weak legal protection for intellectual property provides the ideal context to study this question. Using interview and survey data from captive R&D centers of multinational firms in India, we (1) identify five organizational practices that firms use to protect their knowledge from leaking to competitors in offshore locations, (2) consider whether these practices limit knowledge leakage or limit damage from leaked knowledge, and (3) explore whether they are complements or substitutes.
Databáze: OpenAIRE