Abstract
The present study classified the auto-parts makers into four groups according to their investment ownership. Four groups consist the one fully owned by Koreans, the one fully owned by foreigners, the one owned less than 100% but more than 50% by foreigners, lastly the one owned by less than or equal to 50% by foreigners. Among these, the auto-parts makers, 100% foreign ownership, have the highest Malmquist productivity index while 100% Korean-owned part-makers has the lowest productivity. In case of the 100% foreign ownership companies, the cause of Malmquist change, however, is attributed to the technical efficiency change. In particular, the pure technical change is the main source of the Malmquist change. This may indicate that the 100% foreign-owned companies have successfully transferred their production process technologies to the Korean plants. They are enjoying so called the "imitation-effect." 100% Korean-owned companies were not able to create the "imitationeffect" and therefore failed to close the gap with the foreign-owned companies in terms of the production efficiency. 100% Korean-owned auto-parts makers, however, outperformed the foreign-owned companies in the technological change. The outstanding technological change may indicate that Korean-owned part makers were able to narrow the gap with the foreign-owned companies in the area of engineering technological capabilities. The same results were also observed for 50% foreign-owned companies. Knowing that the core competence of the auto-parts makers lies on the engineering technological capabilities, the research found that the most desirable form of the foreign investment was 50% of foreign ownership.
