Industrial Development, Globalization and Multinational Enterprises: New Realities for Developing Countries

Globalization has changed economic realities. First, the competences of multinational enterprises (MNEs) are becoming increasingly mobile and knowledge-intensive. MNEs thus give more attention to the availability and quality of the created assets of alternative locations. Second, among developing countries there are now considerable differences between the catching-up countries (e.g. newly industrialized countries) and falling behind , less developed countries. These developments have helped change the opportunity sets of both MNEs and host countries. Foreign direct investment (FDI)-based development strategies are now commonplace among less developed countries, but there is also increased competition for the right kinds of investment. In general, the balance in bargaining power has shifted in favour of the MNE, and less developed countries increasingly need to provide unique, non-replicable created assets to maintain a successful FDI-assisted development strategy.