Empirical analysis of the competitive trade position

Abstract

This chapter describes the current state and trends of the internationalisation of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) activities in EU25 from a quantitative point of view. In this chapter, internationalisation is defined simply as the quantity of international trade among nations. The focus is on European Union (EU) member states and other countries such as, Korea, Japan, and the US. The aim of this chapter is to reveal the possible drivers behind the trade in ICT goods and services. Although trade with countries such as China and India is taken into account, an explanation of these developments through an investigation of underlying forces is not possible due to severe data limitations. For instance, information on labour productivity and R&D investment per sector are often not available for many non-OECD countries, let alone for a time series analysis. The latter is necessary to depict the dynamics of trade in ICT goods and services. © 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.