Talk:Multinational corporation: Difference between revisions

==Demarcation between Multinational i think this sucks 86.138.113.59|86.138.113.59]] (talk) 07:49, 1 November 2007 (UTC) HARPREET DUSANJH RESEARCH FELLOW, INDIA

YOU DONT NEED TO TALK IN ALL CAPS

DAVID BOWMAN, EDIT NINJA, BEHIND YOU

The difference = there isn't any major difference as such. It is a term which has evolved over time - multinational corporation being the first title and transnational being the more modern name. This is because corporations now operate transnationally abroad - not just nationally or regionally as competition has become more fierce/widepsread. So, as the term suggests, as the multinational companies have advanced into markets overseas and worldwide, they have become transnational - rather than just multinational or regional. Any standard IPE (International Political Economy) textbook will outline this for you.

(NightShade101 (talk)) —Preceding comment was added at 22:13, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

1930 "start date"

Doesn't the "1930" "start date" look a bit late in the light of this from the BP article?

"In May 1901 William Knox D'Arcy was granted a concession by the Shah of Persia to search for oil, which he found in May 1908. This was the first commercially significant find in the Middle East. In 1909 the Anglo-Persian Oil Company was created to exploit this find. The company grew slowly until World War I when its strategic importance led the British Government to acquire a controlling interest in the company and it became the Royal Navy's chief source of fuel oil during World War I.

"In 1917, the war allowed it to take the British arm of the German Europaische Union, which used the trade name British Petroleum. After the war ended the company, in which the British Government now had a 51% interest, moved to secure outlets in Europe and elsewhere. but its main concern was still Persia, following the Anglo-Persian Agreement of 1919 the company continued to trade profitably in that country."

Robin Patterson 02:26, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Or this:

In 1905 Nestlé merged with the Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company. By the early 1900s, the company was operating factories in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany and Spain. World War I created new demand for dairy products in the form of government contracts. By the end of the war, Nestlé's production had more than doubled.

Robin Patterson 02:32, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Surely the debate should start with colonial nations (primarily Britain and Netherlands) with tea and spice trading and the East India Trading Company, Hudson Bay Trading etc

Dead link

TNCONLINE.net^does not exist anymore

Microsoft

Does MS belong here? Most of people work in Redmond, Washington, US. They have some labs outside US, they have support center in almost every country but I guess they would be only happy to get rid of them if possible. Does multinational == big? Pavel Vozenilek 01:58, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

My understanding is Multinational means offices in multiple countries... those support centers make it a multinational company. Graniterock 00:43, Mar 4, 2005 (UTC)

My understanding is that multinational implies large, formerly independent units in many countries. That MS has localisation and call centers doesn't fit the picture that much. (Someone had also added Google who doesn't have even these, AFAIK.) I think huge steelmakers/car manufacturer/food processors/etc are better examples. Pavel Vozenilek 19:42, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

MS and Google do not just have call centers, they do business in these countries, get sued and sanctioned by the governments of these countries, and follow different laws in every single one of these countries. If that isn't multinational I don't know what is --Alterego 19:56, Mar 4, 2005 (UTC)

I agree... the act of doing significant business and having a presence in other countries makes it multinational. I'm still trying to to research the transational thing. It has to do with not having a cetralized head office. Microsoft would be multi-national because it is clearly based out of the US. A transnational company is much more decentralized often purchasing services from contractors rather than owning them directly. This way, the company is not directly responsible for the contractors - they can cut themselves off and fluidly move into another country rather than having to face the legal rammifications. Graniterock 20:58, Mar 5, 2005 (UTC)

Multinational vs Transnational?

I have to verify this - but I have been lead to beleive that a Multinational company is what is described on the page with a centrailzed head quarters. A transnational company has no "head office" and move whatever base of operations it has fluidly between its national offices.

If this ends up being correct should I create a new article and disable the redirects? Or am I better to just make a note of it within the page itself?

Thanks! - Graniterock

I would suggest to make a note on "the page itself" and then redirect transnational company to this page. --PBS27 15:35, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

graniterock - make a new page and interlink the two somewhere; by the way, i believe you are right!213.6.36.71 11:33, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

Does a software development company come under MNC? Although, there is no physical things produced, but they happen to run their operations across two or more countries. Especially in case of Arabic Countries, at times it is easier to have a small office set up over there to keep operations costs low, while transfer the development job to India or China or wherever. Npindia 00:16, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Was Dutch East India Company the first multinational?

I believe this article (http://www.bartleby.com/65/fu/Fugger.html) proves otherwise.

The Dutch were the first.Not the British.

I would argue that the Templars were the first multinational in terms of business. They capitalized on their immense wealth and holdings to more than one country (and government)... way before the Dutch imagined or the British established the "East India Trading Company". Rarelibra 15:03, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps the whole part about the Knight's Templar should just be removed, until a conclusion can be made. It doesn't seem very encyclopedic to say "Some believe A, while others believe B", without ever reaching a valid conclusion. Make up your mind, and if a different conclusion is discovered to be correct, change the article to reflect it. Sandwiches99 02:39, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

where are these examples from?

included (what for?):

Apple Computer (Revenue $ 13.93 billion USD)

Fonterra (Revenue $ 6.80 billion USD)

Google (Revenue $ 3.19 billion USD and multinational??)

Kyocera

Nike (Revenue $ 13.74 billion USD)

Nintendo (Revenue $ 4.64 billion USD)

Nortel Networks (Revenue $ 9.82 billion USD)

Parmalat (both bankrupt and never a truly big player)

Schlumberger (Revenue $ 17.46 billion USD)

Yahoo! (Revenue $ 3.57 billion USD !!)

not included (why not?):

Allianz (Revenue $128.00 billion USD)

Altria Group (Revenue $ 89.61 billion USD)

AXA (Revenue $ 72.00 billion USD)

Boeing (Revenue $ 52.45 billion USD)

Chevron Corporation (Revenue $155.30 billion USD) !!

Citigroup (Revenue $108.28 billion USD)

ConocoPhillips (Revenue $136.90 billion USD) !!

DaimlerChrysler (Revenue $19.32 billion USD) !!

ING Group (Revenue $ 92.80 billion USD)

Samsung (Revenue $116.80 billion USD)

Siemens AG (Revenue $ 75.17 billion USD)

Total (Revenue $159.00 billion USD) !!

Volkswagen AG (Revenue $156.00 billion USD) !!

... and quite a few other more worthy candidates

Sebastian Leibnitz | [[User talk:Name|Talk]] 23:57, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

I'll change the lot if there is no complain... Sebastian Leibnitz | [[User talk:Name|Talk]] 22:33, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes please. I was going to ask the same question. Airbus ($34 b) can be used as example of multinational corporation from the beginning. Pavel Vozenilek 22:02, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

multinationals in sectors of economis

hi,i would like to know what attracts multinational corporations to specific sectors of the economy. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.21.112.18 (talk) 11:00, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

multinational companies are a big drawback for devoleping contries like INDIA

'india one of a prestigious devoleping nation' —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.68.95.59 (talk) 11:39, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Unsubstantiated

Avoiding transport cost is not really an incentive because transportation costs, at least on a large scale, are generally relatively cheap relative to the price of the product. Only heavy or large products may need to be produced in the market they are intended to sell in, products such as building materials. Ah, no. Try moving liquid oxygen or any other industrial gas across long distances and you'll find that the transport costs are prohibitive. Many chemicals -- very light -- are in the same category. (The comment also isn't sourced.)

Many MNCs are large in relation to the national income of the countries in which they are located. This means that it is not as easy for the host governments to enforce national laws on MNCs. How does a government's failure to enforce its own laws end up in an "ethical issues" section of an article on MNCs? Wouldn't this be better placed in an article on corruption or poor governance?

In a highly competitive world, companies seek to reduce their costs as much as possible. The prospect of a foreign company setting up in a country where labour is cheap is attractive both for the company and the host country's government. Labor is, in very, very many cases, an insignificant portion of total production costs.

In general, I find this article to be bias against MNCs. DOR (HK) (talk) 08:47, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Copyright problems

This article was listed for evaluation at Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2009 April 26. The section on "Market imperfections" infringes on the 2000 book The nature of the transnational firm with a combination of close paraphrase and direct duplication, both comprehensive non-literal similarity and fragmented literal similarity. For example, compare the text in our article: "If there are unique assets of value overseas, why not sell or rent these assets to local entrepreneurs, who could then combine them with local factors of production at lower costs than those experienced by foreign direct investors?" with the source: "If a firm has some unique assets of value overseas, why not sell or rent those assets to local entrepreneurs, who could then combine them with local factors of production at lower costs than those experienced by foreign direct investors?" (emphasis added) The duplication continues, with the next sentence (for example) copied verbatim. While the source is cited, we cannot duplicate text from other sources or closely paraphrase them to comply with our copyright policy (see also the copyright FAQ). Duplicated text used under fair use must comply with our non-free content guidelines, which sets out those limited circumstances under which text may be duplicated verbatim and requires that duplicated text be properly noted with quotation marks. Given the extensiveness of duplication here, the entire section will need to be removed or revised, unless permission to use it can be verified. It has been blanked to allow time to address these concerns. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:03, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Additional discussion of this matter, including another example of duplicated text, is in user talk. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:49, 4 May 2009 (UTC)