Multinational Corporations’ Responses to Changing Intellectual Property Regimes: Knowledge Protection or Knowledge Sharing?

This paper develops a multi-level conceptual framework to explain how multinational corporations (MNCs) from both developed and emerging economies respond to the global strengthening of intellectual property (IP) regimes. Adopting a co-evolutionary perspective, the study extends existing literature by integrating the knowledge-based view with institutional theory. It explores MNC strategies through propositions encompassing country-, industry-, and firm-level factors. The framework highlights that IP regimes have strengthened due to the transition to knowledge economies, international trade agreements, and domestic innovation policies in emerging economies. MNCs navigate these regimes by balancing internal knowledge sharing and external linkages, influenced by IP regime strengths, strategic priorities, industry dynamics, firm capabilities, and home/host country mismatches. Emerging economy MNCs, facing latecomer status and asset disadvantages, are likely to leverage external linkages more extensively. While conceptual, the study sets the stage for empirical testing, offering valuable insights into MNCs’ strategic responses to evolving IP landscapes.