Characteristics and Host Country Drivers of Chinese FDI in Europe: A Company-level Analysis

The present study of direct investment from mainland China into Europe complements and extends prior studies by building on a firm-level database comprising of 548 Chinese subsidiaries in 26 countries in EU and EFTA. The study identifies and characterises three segments of subsidiaries, predominantly related, respectively, to private companies' market-seeking activities, state-owned companies' production- and technology-seeking activities, and efficiency-seeking activities in Eastern Europe. Through multivariate regression the study confirms that potentials for market exploitation are particularly important host country factors for attracting Chinese FDI. There is no strong correlation between aggregate national R&D spending and Chinese knowledge-seeking investments, reflecting that such investments tend to be individual and highly idiosyncratic cases. Rather than a wholesale adoption or dismissal of extant FDI-theories vis-à-vis new ones, extant theories are found to apply differentially to the different identified segments of Chinese outward FDI.