US Firms’ Business Competence in the Taiwanese IT Industry

This chapter provides the point of departure for further discussion on the topic of strategy and strategy change in foreign subsidiaries. The contemporary literature supports the development of the research objectives by identifying the linkages between strategy and strategy change in foreign subsidiaries and functional units. The first part of the review on organisational strategy and structure analyses the various levels of strategy, with a particular focus on functional unit strategy. The second part draws on a range of literature on global integration and local responsiveness framework that analyse the strategic roles of MNEs and foreign subsidiaries. It shows why the international business literature has increasingly concentrated on structural integration and strategic responsiveness. The third part draws on research on the strategy change and the determinants of strategy change in foreign subsidiaries. The conclusion of the contemporary literature identifies the gaps in the literature and the research questions that the manuscript seeks to answer. Methodology describes the data and the estimation approach. It discusses the methodologies adopted in previous studies on strategies of MNEs and foreign subsidiaries, while considering any likely problems or limitations. The methodology explains the case study method, which seeks to capture the complex interaction between organisational actors. The section also explains the process of data collection in the form of semi-structured interviews with executive managers of subsidiaries and managers of functional units in US-owned subsidiaries in Taiwan’s IT industry, as well as resources collated from official documents, annual reports, company publications and media reports.