Doctoral Dissertation Research: Collaboration on Thin Ground: Contract Production Arrangements Between Taiwanese Firms and their American MNC Customers in the PC Industry

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This dissertation project examines the Original Equipment Manufacturing/Original Design Manufacturing arrangements between Taiwanese firms and their American MNC customers in the personal computer (PC) industry. It focuses on the issue of cooperation between them as contract production partners and addresses the question of how they have managed to initiate, sustain and deepen their cooperation in an industry generally considered to be relatively knowledge intensive given their cultural differences and the weakly regulated global economy. Its secondary task is to determine the quality of cooperation found between these firms by contrasting it with instances of customer-supplier cooperation found in economies that are known to be endowed with thick culture and institutions. The project employs the approach of multiple comparative case studies. Data is collected through archival research as well as structured interviews with relevant firms in Taiwan and their American customers and, if necessary, in-depth interviews with Taiwanese government officials. Through examining the phenomenon of inter-firm cooperation across national borders, the project is expected to shed light on the more general problems in social sciences of how and what kinds of cooperation are possible in a thin cultural and institutional environment. It is also expected to have broad empirical significance given the growing recognition of the importance of inter-firm cooperation in those parts of the world not blessed with a rich socio-institutional infrastructure and in developing countries eager to engage in industrial upgrading by taking advantage of the spread of MNCs-led international production networks in the high-tech sectors.