Motives and Modes of Fdi in Poland: An Exploratory Qualitative Study

Zusammenfassung

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The present paper is based on a complex analysis of the results from a survey of seven subsidiaries of multinational corporations (MNCs), which entered the Polish market in the early nineties, and focuses on the motives and modes of setting up these subsidiaries. The survey design has been based on an extensive literature review and the collected data are analysed using a within-case and cross-case approach. The findings of this exploratory study lead to the formulation of pertinent hypotheses that may serve as possible guidelines for undertaking and stimulating future research based on larger and more representative samples of MNC subsidiaries.

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Auszug

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Motives and Modes of Fdi in Poland: An Exploratory Qualitative Study

1. Introduction

Foreign direct investment (FDI) has played a pivotal role in the transformation of post-communist economies of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) for more than a decade now. This is especially true for Poland which experienced a phenomenal growth of inward FDI. The analysis of inflow of FDI into Poland since the beginning of the transformation process reveals an uninterrupted increase in the inflow until 2001 when the first decline occurred (by almost 40 percent), followed by the second decline in 2002 on a smaller scale. It is worth noting that these declines were consistent with observed world-wide trends (UNCTAD 2003). The growth resumed in the subsequent years and FDI flows into Poland reached a record level of 12.9 billion in 2004 (UNCTAD 2006).

Poland remains one of the top FDI destinations in CEE, although the rank of Poland turns out to be different when FDI stock per capita is considered (Poland occupies the 7th position in this respect). Four countries dominate as foreign investors in Poland - France, USA, Germany and the Netherlands. In 2002, when the primary research for this paper was conducted, these four countries jointly accounted for more than 50 percent of the total FDI stock in Poland (see Table 1). Through establishing their subsidiaries in the Polish market, firms from these four and other investor countries were instrumental in transforming failing state-owned firms into viable operations or in creating new enterprises, thus restructuring, modernising and generally changing the structure of entire industries. The investment modes used included acquisitions, green-field investments and joint venture operations.

Data documenting investment mode choice in Poland are scarce, fragmentary and often based on estimates. According to these data, in 1990 only approx. 3% of foreign direct investment projects in Poland were undertaken through green-fi...

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