Internationalization Strategies and Productivity: Evidence from Foreign Owned Companies Operating in the Greek Manufacturing Sector

This paper using Malmquist productivity indexes analyzes the impact of internalization on productivity efficiency and competitive advantage for a sample of 395 firms with foreign ownership operating in the Greek manufacturing sector. A number of different factors in respect to firms’ productivity performance and creation of competitive advantage are been explored. The productive and most competitive firms with foreign ownership seem to have definite and strong characteristics relative to their size. Our empirical results imply that the resources (tangible and intangible) which are utilized and obtained through the firms internationalization strategies have a direct impact on the firms’ productivity and hence to their competitive advantage.