sence in these areas to effectively utilize and access this new research from foreign universities and research labs. Previously, research and development organizations were located close to the corporate base because most of the decisions regarding R&D were made there. This would no longer possible if these firms were to effectively utilize and commercialize new research on a truly global scale. This led to this new model of managing global research and development, to either provide the home base with new sources of technology or to be used to transfer technology into a foreign market to gain competitive advantage.For years, Japanese companies have come to the US, bought or borrowed the best American technology and sold it back as finished products (Susan Moffat 84). In this context, the Japanese have been incredibly successful in managing their global industrial research and development labs and the scientific networks that they formed. After the end of World War II, with the Japanese economy and industrial research laboratories in shambles, the Japanese looked to the US for new innovative ideas and technical expertise. With the wealth of information available in the US in the public domain and licensing agreements with some major companies such as RCA, the Japanese were able to commercialize innovative American ideas and bring them to the market before its American counterparts. For example; The VCR was licensed out to the Japanese because the parent American company did not realize its potential and later ended up competing against its own technology that had been improved by the Japanese. The reasons the Japanese were able to identify key technologies and bring them onto the market faster are threefold. One, it had a huge advantage over its American counterparts in that it had switched to using the applied model of industrial research a lot longer. This was before the failings of the traditional model of industrial research became...
