A thesis study submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Business Administration in Management of Technology, School of Management

Thesis (M.B.A.) - Asian Institute of Technology

The consumer electronics industry in Thailand is one of the fast growing industry. Therefore the competition in this industry is high. To gain more competitive edge, a firm has to develop its technology capabilities. This study attempts to understand possible progression of firms in term of technology capabilities development. This study classified the industry development progression path as: hundred percent assembly, manufacturing of simple parts, design circuit board, and design and manufacturing of major components. A framework was developed to assess the technology capabilities at the firm level. It looks into three dimensions of a firm: sophistication of technology embodiments, technology capabilities self-reliance, and technology strategy options. Technology embodiments consist of: physical facilities, human resources, documents and facts, and organization framework. Technology capabilities consist of: utilization capability, compilation capability, acquisition capability, and generation capability. Technology strategy options are: leader technology strategy, follower technology strategy, exploiter technology strategy and extender technology strategy. The framework was applied to study in five selected firms. The selection was based on type of ownership and position in industry development path of these firms. The usefulness and limitation of the proposed framework are discussed and recommendation for future study have been made with a view towards further refining the proposed framework.