Air cargo services in Asian industrialising economies: Electronics manufacturers and the strategic use of advanced producer services

摘要

The use of advanced producer services is critical to manufacturing firms in industrialising economies, but most research on such services has been situated in wealthy post-industrial economies. We examine the use of one class of advanced producer services – those provided by the air cargo industry – by manufacturers in Southeast Asia. The air cargo industry has grown rapidly in this region and plays an increasingly important intra- and interregional integrative role. We are interested specifically in the demand for knowledge-intensive advanced air cargo services, which include for instance time-definite express services, by electronics manufacturers in Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines. Employing several analytical approaches, we find that demand for advanced air cargo services is related to the degree to which a firm's operations are knowledge-intensive, its size, and the scope of its internationalisation.