Optimal dispersion of R&D activities in multinational corporations with a genetic algorithm

This paper presents a new communication-economic network model to predict the allocation of R&D activities in MNCs. While traditional models examine the influencing factors of R&D internationalization separately for each country and come to a one-dimensional result, this multi-dimensional approach integrates the influencing factors in a way that allows to identify an efficient configuration of the entire R&D subsystem in many countries at a time. It captures the information flows and employs a genetic algorithm to find a dispersion of R&D activities in which the problems of international communication have the least negative impact. The model is tested with data from seven MNCs covering a range of 48 countries as potential R&D locations.