2026-09-26T21:38:53Z https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/130153 2026-02-10 col_2142_5131 col_2142_14791 com_2142_5130 com_2142_14790 com_2142_9216

application/pdf en text Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2027-08-01 The student, Der-Ting Huang, accepted the attached license on 2025-07-08 at 18:22. The student, Der-Ting Huang, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2025-07-08 at 18:49. This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2025-07-09 at 15:50. DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #22449 on 2025-10-25 at 15:53:22 Essays on location strategies, institutional environments, and knowledge/resource management Huang, Der-Ting 2025-07-09 Clougherty, Joseph A. Clougherty, Joseph A Mahoney, Joseph T Yao, Fiona Kun Kim, Min Jung Multinational Corporations (mncs) Institutional Environments Resource Management Transaction Cost Economics (tce) eng The overarching question of this dissertation is: How do multinational corporations (MNCs) choose their locations and make investment decisions, considering both their internal structures and the external environments at local, regional, and international levels? This dissertation comprises three empirical essays that explore the relationship between firms’ investment location strategies and institutional environments at different geographic levels: subnational and supranational levels. Essay 1 investigates how international economic agreements (i.e., multilateral, regional, and bilateral economic agreements) differ in enhancing cross-border transactions, finding that regional economic agreements are more effective, especially in high-risk host countries. Essay 2 theorizes that multinationality—defined as the geographic dispersion of resource assets across countries—as an internal sourcing mechanism that reduces the likelihood of MNCs entering industry clusters, particularly when in-network resources have greater cross-border transferability. Essay 3 examines how MNCs interpret the prior cluster entry behavior of foreign industry peers as information cues to guide their own foreign investment decisions in industry clusters, with peer signals being especially strong in high-tech industries where resource access uncertainty is more critical. To sum up, my entire dissertation enhances our understanding of how firms navigate and respond to diverse institutional environments to inform their location and investment strategies. 2025-08 Text https://hdl.handle.net/2142/130153 Copyright 2025 Der-Ting Huang Business Administration Business Administration University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Ph.D. Dissertation