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Outsourcing R&D in the Electronics Industry (Technical Insights)
Frost & Sullivan, Feb 2006
This Frost & Sullivan research service titled Outsourcing R&D in the Electronics Industry provides information on organizations, companies, universities, research institutions, and government agencies involved in the outsourcing and offshoring of R&D activities in the information and communications technology (ICT), semiconductor, as well as electronics industries. It further lists noteworthy industry activities in the arena and summarizes government regulations that regulate the growth of outsourcing/offshoring activities. A summary of key patents gives an insight into notable activities, technology trends, and important participants in this field.
Market Sectors
Expert Frost & Sullivan analysts thoroughly examine the following market sectors in this research:
- Outsourcing R&D in the electronics industry
Market Overview
Increasing Globalization Spurs Growth of R&D Outsourcing in Electronics Industry
Considering the rapid progress in technology as well as the significant cost and price advantages to be gained, an increasing number of multinational corporations in the electronics industry are beginning to outsource more of their R&D activities. Developing countries are proving to be the fastest growing markets for outsourcing electronics R&D. In addition to the large pool of highly educated and skilled English-speaking workforce, the availability of a robust education system and low costs are the most decisive factors influencing the flow of R&D-related foreign direct investment (FDI) into a developing country. Key industries that are shifting their electronics R&D outsourcing to overseas destinations include medical instrumentation, aerospace, automotive, and telecommunications.
Among the major outsourcing destinations, China is the most attractive country in the world for FDI in the R&D sector. The proportion of Chinas spending in R&D to its gross domestic product (GDP) is on the increase and this ratio could surpass that of the European Union (EU) in the next five years. Multinational companies, which first partnered with local investors in the R&D sector in China, are now establishing their wholly owned centers and in the last decade, the number of patents filed by these multinational companies increased at an average rate of 30.0 percent every year. 'In addition to China, India is also emerging as a major R&D hub and private sector research in electronic components and ICT sectors has received a major boost as a result of growing off-shoring and outsourcing activities,' notes the analyst of this research service. 'Apart from software technologies, India is also emerging as a R&D hub in electronics hardware, which is seen in the ability of Agilent Technologies India Pvt. Ltd to develop pioneering state-of-the-art technology for the test and measurement instrument industry.'
Trend Toward Global Networks of Innovation
A notable trend in the R&D outsourcing industry is the move toward developing global networks for the purpose of product development. Through this, companies are leveraging the capabilities of different regions to build an efficient R&D chain. For instance, Europe specializes in the medical, automation, as well as automotive technologies and the United States specializes in instrumentation and control as well as the biotechnology and nanotechnology sectors, while India specializes in software and China in production technologies. Setting up R&D facilities in each of these locations based on their capabilities for distributed product development has escalated the quality of products and decreased the time for development. Hence, an innovation model could involve a U.S. chip designer, a software development company from India, and an electronic product development firm based in China.
With regard to the notable outsourced R&D developments in the electronics industry, the R&D center of Nortel situated in Guangzhou, China has carried out a demonstration of what is viewed as a breakthrough in wireless networks technology. 'The seamless handoff of broadband voice and multimedia services as well as Nortels first session initiation protocol (SIP)-based video call handover between a live high-speed downlink packet access (HSDPA) network and a wireless network was demonstrated by the company,' says the analyst. 'As a result of this technology, uninterrupted connections to broadband services is likely to be possible, while roaming between 3G networks and WiFi, WLANs, and wireless mesh networks.'
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