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

Research Studies Project Report (M.B.A.) - Asian Institute of Technology, 1991

The objective of the study is to develop a simple methodology to assess the technology content of a transformation operation with a view towards evaluating the technology content of the Board-of-Investment (BOI)-approved-foreign-investment-based ventures already in operation in the industrial sector of Thailand. Data for this study was collected from the BOI and the focus was on ventures promoted between 1961-1989 with more than one percent foreign shareholders. The results show that most of the promoted firms are resource or labor intensive in nature and could be considered to be predominantly low or medium technology content operations. Almost all the firms are heavily dependent on imported plant and equipment especially those in high and very high technology content operations. Firms with high and very high technology content operations also appear to have more expatriate staff on their payroll. Low technology content firms also seem to be paying most for know-how and are also repatriating higher profits than firms in the other categories. All companies irrespective of technology content appear to have a high degree of export competitiveness and all companies, except those in the low technology content category have a very high degree of dependence on material imports. Policy implications based on these findings are discussed and policy interventions that may be useful to attract higher technology content ventures are suggested.