RECENTLY, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak announced the plan for the development of Greater Penang, which would comprise the state of Penang and extend to the Kulim High Tech Park and Perak industrial parks. As Greater Penang competes with other globally competitive locations to attract the best human capital and high-value investments, it needs to move up to the next high stage of development and innovation-driven economy, reinforce Penang’s existing strengths and most importantly, get Penang’s technological innovative capabilities up to speed.
To examine whether internationalisation of technological innovative capabilities has spread to Greater Penang and Klang Valley, it is necessary to examine the extent to which firms in the electronics industry have developed significant levels of innovative technological capabilities, and the speed at which successively higher levels of technological capability have been built up. The research traced out the paths of technological development of firms over as long a period as possible (usually since establishment), which allowed me to address an important but frequently ignored question: how long does it actually take firms to build up different levels of technological capabilities?
