The aim of the paper is, firstly, to identify a number of strategies Swiss firms pursue by performing foreign R&D, expecting that firms, in many instances, are driven by a combination of several motives (mixed strategies). Secondly, we ask whether foreign and domestic R&D are substitutes or...

The paper complements entry mode research by dealing with the choice of alternative modes of governance in the specific case of foreign R&D and its impact on a parent firm’s performance. Firstly, we identify the factors that determine whether a firm locates abroad any R&D activities, and, if...

The paper investigates empirically the decision of firms to adopt Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) based on a comprehensive specification of a "rank model" of technology adoption (complemented by "epidemic effects") using firm-level data for the Swiss business sector. The...

The aim of this paper is, firstly, to contribute to the understanding of innovation patterns in services. To this end, firms which are similar in terms of a large set of innovation indicators were grouped into clusters. For the Swiss case, it was possible to identify five clusters which exhibit...

The literature on the internationalisation of firms has paid little attention to SMEs. SME-oriented studies are predominantly descriptive or illustrating theoretical arguments, and those dealing with services are mostly confined to specific industries. The paper aims at correcting some of these...

The aim of this paper is twofold: Firstly, we try to identify and characterise different types of strategies firms pursue in performing foreign R&D. Secondly, it is analysed whether the types of R&D strategies we identified in the first part differ in terms of their impact on firm productivity....