Global R&D Network: A Research On Spatial Structure Of MNCs' R&D Globalization

R&D activities of Multinational Corporations is spreading in the world and is emerging on the spatial level, the same as the activities of manufacture and distribution, the MNCs' R&D concentrated in north America and west Europe before 1960s, Triad (north America, west Europe and Japan) in the latter 20 century, and is spreading to new industrial countries in recent years, which showed obvious global spatial growth trend of MNCs' R&D activities. The spatial spreading of the MNCs' R&D showed in investment region and R&D lab's decentralization, patent application increasing outside home country and the growth of the technology alliances.Based on the review of theories of MNCs' R&D globalization, the author describes the spatial distribution and the trend of the spreading of the MNCs' R&D globalization from the globe spatial, and analyzes the strategy motivation, organization model, form of the spatial organization, development direction and the inter-relations of the MNCs' R&D activities. The form of the MNCs' R&D is thought to be the general framework of the global R&D network. The result of spatial growth of the MNCs' global R&D network is collaborated by the regional attraction and the corporations' out-push.The paper uses the methods of factor analysis to analyze MNCs' global R&D network, identifies the spatial structure of MNCs' R&D globalization for five levels: nucleus, high density, middle density, lower density and lowest, defines the distribution in geography and the perspective of the MNCs' R&D globalization; and describes the global R&D network as three sub-regions: America, Europe and Asia-pacific, their respective centers are America, German and Japan, each sub-region is a field -radiation made up of one center and four layers from strong to weak. Otherwise, the paper classifies stylebooks economies for three types: all-development, market orient and environment advantage.The paper suggests that the effect of spatial structural interrelation MNCs' globalR&D network is achieved by element and energy flows, such as R&D elements reunion between network nodes, enlargement of the network node's radiation, diffusion of the R&D output through networking. Fund flow, brain flow, information flow as R&D resources, and technology flow, patent flow and hi-tech flow as R&D output, make a social-economic relations between elements outflow and inflow area , by three forms of spatial structural interrelation: agglomerative and diffusive effect, neighbor effect and transmission effect, and achieve the interrelation and interaction of the MNCs' global R&D network.The author thinks that China has already belonged to high density R&D country in the global R&D network, but still is be a diffusive accepting place, for lacking of basic research and innovation, unbalance of inflow and outflow prevent the build of the MNCs' global R&D network node. China should give more prominence to the tech-centre city so as to bring the whole country to global R&D network, attract the famous global or regional MNCs' R&D centers, develop our science and technology, cultivate comparative MNCs and internationalize Chinese corporation R&D rapidly.