Download Abstract4E - Uppsala Centre for Business History (UCBH)

Transfer of innovation and managerial models by foreign industrialists to
South Russia (late 19th- early 20th century)
The paper will present results of my research into processes of transfer of innovations
and managerial models by foreign industrialists to Russia during the period of preSoviet industrialization. By the end of the 19th century, – besides such centers as
Moscow and Petersburg – South Russia became the main area and channel for the
transfer and adaptation of Western European models of industrial production, having
outrun the Ural region in volumes, rates and innovations.
The prominent role played by foreign investment and industrial technologies in the
Russian industrialization process has been well known for scholarship both in Russia
and abroad. In my paper, I intend to focus on a specific aspect: the role of foreign
entrepreneurship in transferring new managerial ideas (scientific management) and
practical managerial models. Can we attribute – using A. Chandler’s term – the
appearance of the “Visible hand” in Russia mainly to the foreigners, i.e. can we
evaluate the managerial revolution as a phenomenon that was mostly imported from
the West? Or was it rather a result of an evolution within the traditional family firms
induced by the process of associating their capitals? How can we define, through the
prism of assessing the role of foreign businessmen, the peculiarities of the creation of
modern industrial enterprise and the appearance of professional manager class in the
Russian Empire?
The research to be presented was based on the analysis of industrial censuses and
further official statistics, and unpublished sources housed in local Ukrainian archives
providing information for case studies.
"Internationalization
joins
Innovation:
Applying
the
Uppsala
Internationalization Process Model to the German and Swiss Pharmaceutical
Industries before 1939". I am sorry for the delay but I have not been in the
office last week.
Tobias Cramer
200 words abstract:
"So far the success of science-based industries, such as the pharmaceutical
industry, has primarily been attributed to their R&D capabilities. Mainstream
business history identifies the elaboration of innovative new pharmaceuticals as
the prime driver of corporate growth and competitive advantage. However,
extensive international marketing and sales networks have early been named one
of the essential “organizational capabilities” of the German chemical industry
(Beer 1959, Chandler 1990). Surprisingly, until today these networks have not
been studied in depth.
According to Mira Wilkins (1974) different stages in the internationalization
process of (US-) firms can be identified. Building on similar observations of
the
Swedish
Industry,
Johanson
and
Vahlne
(1977)
build
their
internationalization process model which established what came to be known as
the Uppsala school in international business. Their model explains corporate
internationalization steps with increasing market knowledge generated in a
learning process of local conditions. The dynamic learning process thus includes
“time” as a key variable and is therefore predestined for historical research.
This paper uses the Uppsala model to analyze the generation of international
market knowledge by German and Swiss pharmaceutical firms before 1939. For the
first time a data set of more than 100 unpublished agency contracts from more
than a dozen major companies is analyzed."