Developing Country Multinationals : South-South Investment Comes of Age

Large Western corporations have long invested overseas to penetrate markets, seek resources, and increase efficiency. After the explosion of inward FDI to the South in the 1990s, it is now the turn of the largest companies from emerging and transition economies, including the so-called BRICs, to intensify their outward FDI through mergers and acquisitions as well as greenfield investments. The contours of this emerging phenomenon are described in this paper, with a focus on the quantification of the weight of South-South FDI flows and their developmental consequences.