Knowledge Management in Multinational Corporations

Knowledge management in multinational corporations encompasses the practices and processes by which global organisations create, share and apply information to sustain competitive advantage. At its core lies the movement of expertise across borders—both from headquarters to subsidiaries and in reverse—underpinned by formal mechanisms such as technology-enabled repositories and informal networks that foster social capital. Effective knowledge management addresses the tension between global integration and local responsiveness, ensuring that best practices travel smoothly while adapting to cultural and institutional contexts. Central to this endeavour are concepts of absorptive capacity and embeddedness, which determine a unit’s ability to recognise external knowledge, assimilate it and apply it to local innovation. Recent digitalisation has introduced new platforms for collaboration and real-time analytics, yet it also raises challenges related to data governance and the preservation of tacit knowledge. Multinational enterprises increasingly leverage open innovation intermediaries to bridge internal and external sources of insight, while expatriate assignments and repatriation processes have been reconfigured to support two-way knowledge flows. Strategic alignment of headquarters mandates, subsidiary mandates and regional management functions further shapes how knowledge is governed across the network. In practice, fostering a culture of continuous learning and ensuring cognitive and structural connectivity across units remain critical for translating dispersed insights into tangible innovations and sustainable growth.

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Knowledge Management in Multinational Corporations publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in knowledge management in multinational corporations across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Knowledge transfer: The process by which information, skills or expertise move between units or individuals within an organisation.

Absorptive capacity: A unit’s ability to recognise, assimilate and apply external knowledge for innovation.

Embeddedness: The extent to which individuals or units are integrated within social and organisational networks, affecting access to and exchange of knowledge.

Open innovation intermediary: An actor or platform that connects internal R&D resources with external knowledge sources to facilitate innovation across boundaries.

Reverse knowledge transfer: The flow of insights or practices from subsidiary units back to the corporate headquarters or other parts of the organisation.

References

1. Three decades of research on practice transfer in multinational firms: Past contributions and future opportunities. Journal of World Business (2023).
2. The dual knowledge role of open innovation intermediaries: Internal weaving and external filtering for MNE subsidiaries. Technovation (2023).
3. Knowledge integration in multinational enterprises: The role of inventors crossing national and organizational boundaries. Journal of World Business (2022).
4. Coordination at the Edge of the Empire: The Delegation of Headquarters Functions through Regional Management Mandates. Journal of International Management (2012).