Foreign acquisitions and R&D leverage in High Tech industries of peripheral economies. Lessons and policy issues from the Israeli experiences

This paper deals with a major challenge of globalisation to national innovation systems of skill-intensive peripheral economies: acquisitions of high-tech start-up companies by foreign multinational companies. Through a detailed microeconomic analysis both of successful company growth profiles and of post-acquisition patterns, the paper analyses possible implications for high tech and the economy as a whole. It concludes that the share of Start Up output to total high tech output of a country should be an important variable; and that this share was probably "too high" in Israel during 19992000.