A Comparative Study of Productivity in Taiwan''s Electronics Companies：Change of Productivity and Effects Caused by Overseas Investment and Research Input

• Main Authors: Yau, Ying-Hua, 姚盈華
• Other Authors: Chou, Yung-Ho
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2003
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/20936951132973027436

碩士 === 東吳大學 === 經濟學系 === 91 === Abstract In recent years companies in Taiwan’s information and electronics industry have been facing competition in the global market, which makes them more enthusiastic at investing in China under the model of worldwide operations and planning. This causes the rate of domestic production to decrease year after year. The industry is confronted by the pressure of structural adjustment and technical upgrade, and that further affects the growth of productivity. As productivity is one of the crucial competitiveness indexes for companies, understanding of productivity change and sources of this change may be used as the basis of reference for companies to improve operating performance and raise productivity. The main objective of this research is to study productivity change and sources of this change for TSEC-listed and GTSM-listed companies in the electronics industry, and to discuss the effects generated by overseas investment and R&D input upon productivity of companies. As for the research method, a two-phase model is adopted to conduct pertinent analysis. In the first phase, the non-parametric Malmquist productivity index of the frontier approach is utilized, by applying the mathematical planning model of the data envelopment analysis (DEA), to estimate productivity change of 355 companies in the electronics industry from 1998 to 2001, where panel data for the cross-section and time series are used as empirical data to establish each company’s technical boundary as the basis for efficiency measurement. In the second phase, the generalized regression analysis is utilized to probe into major factors affecting productivity of companies in the electronics industry. The results of empirical studies indicate the following. In the first phase, as a whole, the average technical efficiency change index, the pure technical efficiency change index and the scale efficiency change index for the electronics industry from 1998 to 2001 are all greater than 1, which indicates a status of efficiency improvement; the average technological change index and the total productivity (TFP) change index are both smaller than 1, which indicates a status of efficiency decline. The main reasons for the overall fall in productivity of the electronics industry are that technology is deteriorating and that the industry tends to move far away from the constant return to scale (CRS), which explains the trend in recent years that the total production value for Taiwan’s electronics industry decreases through the years and the percentage of companies moving out increases continuously. In the second phase, as a whole, the outward remittance has obviously positive influence on technical efficiency change and pure technical efficiency change, and has obviously negative influence on technical change, scale efficiency change and productivity change. The R&D expenditure has obviously positive influence on technical efficiency change, technical change, pure technical efficiency change and productivity change; its influence on scale efficiency change is positive but non-obvious. This means that even if companies may use existing resources and local resources at the same time to effectively increase operating efficiency after they invest in China, certain companies fail to relatively upgrade production technology for products of their domestic parent companies. Therefore, technical change proceeds rather slowly, and companies still tend to demand lower production costs like labor and land, without considering their global positioning. As a result, the relatively insufficient domestic investment prevents the parent company in Taiwan from reaching the most appropriate product scale, and R&D expenditure can not have much influence on change of scale efficiency in those companies.