Dunning (2000)

Management > Global Firm > Lectures > Independent Research > Dunning > Outward FDI > OA >Theories > Today's OAs

Today's OAs

Today's firms are engaging more in strategic asset-seeking reasons for FDI, due to the increase in value of dynamic OAs, such as intellectual capital.

Resource-based theory needs to re-examine the resources and capabilities of a firm in such a dynamic environment. These include:

Ability to sustain/upgrade these advantages
Ability to harness and influence the quality and price of complementary assets
Ability to identify LAs in other countries in order to create, acquire or develop OAs

Evolutionary theory argues that more attention needs to be paid to the path or process by which specific OAs are accumulated over time.

In contrast to internalisation theory, it regards the firm as an innovator of created assets rather than a "nexus of treaties".

Unlike resource based theory, evolutionary theory focuses on a firm's long-term strategies towards accumulating more capabilities.

Theories