A Study of Regional Headquarters in Japanese Production Multinational Enterprises : How do Regional Headquarters perceive their role?

本研究旨在探讨日本跨国企业地区总部(RHQ)对其角色的认知。大多数研究都是从总部的角度来考虑区域总部的角色。因此，我们对日本跨国公司的RHQ进行了问卷调查，并对回收的数据进行了分析，发现了RHQ与RHQ之间的认知差距。研究结果如下：1.了解RHQ对其角色的认知。例如，我们发现RHQ的主要作用是支持北美的子公司，在欧洲提供管理中心，在亚洲作为地区协调人。2.我们采访了日本跨国公司在新加坡的亚洲RHQ，发现他们在知识中心扮演着重要的角色，即他们存储了大量关于地区业务的地区信息。然而，我们不相信日本跨国公司的亚洲地区总部具有足够的独立性，足以配得上“总部”的头衔。因为大多数日本跨国公司已经从日本手中控制了亚洲业务。本研究的目的是建立一个日本跨国公司的区域战略模型。

The purpose of this study is to investigate how Regional Headquarters (RHQ) in Japanese MNEs perceive their role. Most studies have considered RHQ's roles from a Headquarters (HQ) standpoint. So, we sent a questionnaire RHQ of Japanese MNEs, We analyzed returned data to discover their perception gap between HQ and RHQ.Our findings were as follows ;1.We found how RHQ perceive their role. To give examples, we discovered that RHQ saw their main role as supporting subsidiaries in North American, providing a management center in Europe, and as regional coordinators in Asia.2.We interviewed Asian RHQ of Japanese MNEs in Singapore, finding that they held an important role Knowledge Center, i.e. they store a lot of regional information about regional business. However, we are not convinced that the Asian RHQ of Japanese MNEs are independent enough to warrant the 'Headquarters' title. Because most Japanese MNEs has controlled Asian business from Japan.The aim of this study is to make a model of Regional strategy in Japanese MNEs.