| dc.description.abstract | This paper provides empirical evidence on the relationship between Internet technology and fragmentation. Using the Taiwanese manufacturing Census in 2011 and a balanced panel dataset covering 2006 and 2011 Census, the results show that firms use e-buying, e-selling, e-interior and website have a significant positive effects on engaging in offshoring, foreign outsourcing and triangular trade. Among all these information and communication technologies (ICTs), e-buying is shown to be the most important technology. Notably, this effect doesn′t confine to foreign-owned firms and firms undertaking foreign direct investment. Large firms also benefit more from using ICT. In order to reduce the endogeneity problem of Internet technology, we use propensity score matching for the analysis. We find that firms using e-buying for the first time are 15% more likely to undertake triangular trade. However,the effect diminishes and turns to be insignificant for firms continuing to use e-buying. This imply that first-time e-buying user has a strongest effect on triangular trade and then its effects decrease significantly. For other firm characteristics, R&D, productivity and export performance all have positive effects on foreign outsourcing, offshoring and triangular trade. | en_US |