This thesis deals with the globalization of production, a salient feature of the modern economy. The development of international outsourcing as a widespread business practice and the simultaneous decrease in trade and transport costs have contributed to the growth of a phenomenon known as global value chains. The main aim of the thesis is to understand how global value chains alter the location of economic activity. The thesis also studies the extent of firms' participation in global value chains and its consequences for firm performance.   The thesis consists of four papers studying the behavior of firms in global value chains. Paper 1 analyzes how production fragmentation influences the importing and exporting behavior of Swedish firms in the manufacturing sector. Paper 2 focuses on manufacturing firms in the ICT sector and analyzes the effect of global sourcing on firm performance. In Paper 3, the thesis examines deeper implications of global production by investigating whether exposure to trade raises firms' sensitivity to external shocks. The final paper in the thesis studies the location patterns of multinational firms and analyzes the effect of institutional distance on the number of multinational entries in developing countries.   A number of patterns emerge from these studies. The first is that Swedish manufacturing firms increasingly participate in global value chains by sourcing production inputs from overseas to create products for local and foreign customers. As a result, global value chains help to alter the specialization patterns of manufacturing firms. The second finding is that firms reap benefits from global sourcing in the form of greater efficiency. However, global sourcing may also raise the responsiveness of firms to negative external shocks. The final key result points to a developing trend in the location of activity in which emerging market multinational firms are becoming significant sources of foreign direct investment flows and their investment patterns challenge existing theories of multinational location choice.

This dissertation focuses generally on consumer behavior, and particularly on consumer attitudes toward products of foreign origin for the purpose of developing a theory that will assist in explaining and predicting this phenomenon. Existing research in the area of country of origin effects upon consumer attitudes toward foreign-made products demonstrates significant methodological limitations such as single cue approaches., The major objective of this dissertation is to contribute to the development of a theory based upon the expectancy-value attitude concept to better explain and predict consumer attitudes toward products of foreign origin. To achieve this objective, the research attempts to overcome the limitations identified in attitude research and specific methodological deficiencies in research focusing on attitudes toward products of foreign origin by: 1. utilizing the expectancy-value approach; 2. basing operationalization of the attitude concepts on Likert-like scales and subjective conditional probabilities; 3. measuring the operationalized attitudes both directly and indirectly via beliefs and evaluations; 4. simultaneously including multiple extrinsic cues; 5. including pictorial cues in the questionnaire; and 6. performing and reporting validity and reliability tests. The general model developed in this research, representing the theory of attitudes toward products of foreign origin is the Foreign Product Attitude Model (FPAM). This dissertation will concentrate on an extracted part of the total model, namely the relationships between the informational stimuli cues and the attitudinal response. The informational extrinsic informational cues include the country of origin, the brand name, the store image and an involvement covariate. By concentrating on the above relationships it is hoped that this study will contribute to a better understanding of the direct effects of the informational stimuli upon the attitude toward a product of foreign origin. The country of origin effect and the other extrinsic cues (brand name and store image) were found to have significant effects on consumer attitudes toward products, explaining almost 20 percent of the total variance.

The thesis focuses on the concept of parallel imports in the Czech law in light of the judicature of the European Court of Justice. In the first part of the thesis, after a brief introduction to the Czech trademark law, the thesis seeks to define the individual competencies of trademark owners and their restrictions, with an emphasis on the concept of exhaustion of the rights towards the trademark. The second part of the thesis focuses exclusively on the concept of parallel imports within the European Union and the European Economic Area and their impact on the internal market. The issue of exhaustion of the ownerʼs rights towards the trademark, being closely related to parallel imports and without which parallel imports as such could not exist, represent a key part of the European Court of Justiceʼs rulings. The analysis of the rulings conducted in the thesis demonstrates that the possibilities of trademark owners to inhibit parallel imports are significantly limited and that the European Court of Justice tends to assign greater importance to protecting the internal market than to protecting the subjective rights of the trademark owners.

Parallel imports and trademark law in the Czech Republic This thesis goal is to provide a basic introduction to Czech trademark law and to analyse parallel imports. I wanted to emphasize the "exhaustion of rights "principle in the context of the law of the European Union also in the context of law in the Czech Republic. It covers some of the most intriguing aspects of parallel imports for example "placed on the market", "consent of a trade mark owner", "repackaging and other changed of the parallel imported goods "by examining the most important Court of Justice of the European Union (before European Court of Justice) decisions that have set a solid legal environment and use them to explain how parallel imports have evolved. The thesis focuses on Czech and European trademark law and parallel imports in the law of the Czech Republic, as a member state of European Union. At the first part of thesis I explain what is trademark law, it's sense and intent in general. I also examine the fundamental sources of Czech national trademark law, trademark law of the European Union and international law. Which is followed by description what a "trademark" is and which trademarks are protected in Czech Republic, their functions and "trademark owners" as a basics terminology of trademark law in Czech Republic. Next part...

IN ENGLISH Trade mark law and the issues of parallel imports under Czech law The purpose of the thesis is to analyze the trade mark law and the issues of parallel imports under Czech law. The thesis describes the present situation in the Czech Republic, points out the influence of the European Union and considers the impact of the current regulation of parallel imports concerning trademarked goods. The paper also focuses on the court decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union which have great effect on the law effective in the Czech Republic. The reason for my research is the ongoing international discussion on that topic and the necessity to find balance among contrary interests of trademark owners, parallel importers and consumers. The aim of the thesis is presented at the beginning. The next chapter of the thesis is introductory and defines basic terminology in general. The third chapter looks at the Czech legislation connected to the topic and highlights its connection to the European law. The next section analyzes the law of the European Union and is subdivided into three parts. The first part outlines the historical context and sets out the basic facts. The next part is concerned with a leading principle used in the European Union - the principle of community exhaustion. The last...

La presente tesis analiza los factores que influyeron en la disminución de importaciones de cocinas a gas en los años 2014 y 2015. El primer capítulo brinda información y definiciones de los procesos de importaciones y de la industria de electrodomésticos, se describe como están definidos los productos y cómo están agrupados, por ejemplo: línea blanca, línea marrón. Por otro lado, se explica el panorama mundial del sector de electrodomésticos, el panorama regional de la industria (Latinoamérica) y el panorama nacional de la industria de electrodomésticos; finalmente se analiza los factores planteados para la investigación, los cuales son: nivel de consumo y demanda, producción (principal proveedor), competencia nacional y el boom inmobiliario. En el segundo capítulo, se desarrolla la metodología de investigación de orientación cualitativa, del tipo descriptiva, por la cual, podremos explicar y validar nuestra hipótesis, utilizando herramientas como entrevistas semiestructurada, realizadas a los tres segmentos o grupos de interés identificados: importadores, productores nacionales y principales comercializadores de cocinas. También, se detallarán el proceso de recolección y clasificación de datos. En el tercer capítulo, se analizan los datos recolectados que nos llevaron a obtener los resultados por segmento y categoría. En el cuarto capítulo, se desarrollan los resultados de las entrevistas y la discusión de resultados por segmento y categoría, para identificar los factores que influyeron para la disminución de importaciones de cocinas a gas en los años 2014 y 2015, incluyendo los hallazgos, barreras y brechas de investigación, y, por último, se detalla las conclusiones y recomendaciones. / This thesis reviews the factors that influenced the decrease of gas cookers imports during 2014 and 2015. The first chapter provides the information and definitions of the home appliances industry and the importing processes, it depicts the definition of the products and how they are classified, for instance: white goods and brown goods. On the other hand, it explains the global outlook, the regional outlook (Latin America) and the national outlook of the home appliances industry; finally, it analyzes the factors proposed for investigation: the level of consumption and demand, manufacturing (main supplier), national competition and the real estate boom. The second chapter develops the quality research methodology, descriptive in nature, which will be used to explain and validate the hypothesis, by ways of semi structured interviews performed in the three identified segments or groups of interest: importers, domestic manufacturers and main retailers. The process of data collection and classification will also be detailed in this chapter. The third chapter analyzes the collected data, which led to the segment and category results. The fourth chapter builds on the outcome of the interviews and the debate of the segment and category results in order to identify the factors that influenced the decrease of gas cookers imports during 2014 and 2015, including the findings, obstacles and gaps during the research; and lastly, this chapter elaborates on the conclusions and recommendations. / Tesis

La presente investigación se realizó con el fin de entender y exponer la relación entre los factores económicos y comerciales, y la importación de motocicletas (8711200000) a partir del tratado de libre comercio de Perú con China, con vigencia a partir del 2010. Para ello, se analizó los factores considerados más influyentes que impactan en la cantidad importada de dicha partida durante los años 2008 al 2017, siendo estos el Ad Valorem, el valor FOB y el costo del flete internacional. Para realizar este estudio se utilizó el método de investigación mixto, tomando en cuenta la información estadística de entidades como SUNAT y entrevistas a expertos, esto con la finalidad de obtener una visión más holística del contexto en el que se desarrolló la tesis. Se determinó una relación entre el TLC y el aumento de las importaciones de motos provenientes de China. Las variables independientes tienen alto grado de correlación e influencia en la cantidad de motos importadas. / The present investigation was carried out in order to understand and expose the relationship between economic and commercial factors, and motorcycles imports (8711200000) from the free trade agreement of Peru with China, in force since 2010. For this, the factors considered most influential were analyzed, which impact on the quantity imported during 2008 to 2017, which are Ad Valorem, the FOB value and the international freight cost. To carry out this study, the mixed research method was used, taking into account the statistical information of entities such as SUNAT and interviews with experts, in order to obtain a more holistic view of the context in which the thesis was developed. A relationship between the FTA and increased imports of motorcycles from China was determined. The independent variables have a high degree of correlation and influence on the amount of imported motorcycles. / Tesis

Este trabalho investiga para o Brasil um dos mais importantes debates da literatura da Nova Macroeconomia Aberta: a escolha da moeda na qual a firma exportadora fixará os preços de seu produto vendido no exterior. Duas são as hipóteses possíveis: ou a firma exportadora fixa seu preço com base na sua própria moeda, conhecida como producer currency pricing (PCP),ou ela fixa seu preço com base na moeda do mercado de destino de seu produto, chamada de local currency pricing (LCP). Como muitos dos problemas verificados na literatura macroeconômica têm origem microeconômica, procuramos responder a questão através das observações encontradas na literatura de passthrough e pricing-to-market. Além disto, assumimos que, no agregado, os setores exportadores e importadores brasileiros se comportam como uma firma maximizadora de lucros que vende seus produtos para importadores locais. Isto permite que parte das variações cambiais seja repassada para os preços e parte seja absorvida pelo markup do setor. A metodologia empírica incluiu a estimação de dois VEC’s (vector error correction), um para as exportações e outro para as importações, pelos quais foram calculadas funções de resposta ao impulso e decomposições da variância dos erros de previsão nos preços. Os resultados obtidos indicam casos intermediários das hipóteses de LCP e PCP para o Brasil. Enquanto os preços em dólares das exportações brasileiras estão mais próximos da hipótese de LCP, os preços em reais das importações estão mais próximos da hipótese de PCP. Outros aspectos interessantes também foram observados. Para os preços das exportações brasileiras, a variável mais importante para sua determinação é a condição econômica do resto do mundo, seguida pelos custos do setor exportador. Já para as importações, tanto as condições econômicas domésticas quanto a taxa de câmbio são variáveis importantes, ao passo que os preços em moeda estrangeira das importações não se mostraram significantes no longo prazo, mas apenas no curto prazo. / This work analyzes to Brazil one of the most important debates on the New Open Economy Macroeconomic literature: the choice of the currency in which international prices are fixed. There are two possible hypotheses: either the export firm establishes his prices in your own currency, named producer currency pricing (PCP) or the export firm fix his price in the currency of the market in which his products is sold, named local currency pricing (LCP). Many questions treated in macroeconomic literature have microeconomic foundations. So we look for answering the question using the literature of passthrough and pricing-to-market. In addition to this, we assume that macroeconomic data for Brazilian’s export and import sectors are generated of profit maximizing firms’ behavior. The firms sell their products to local importers, allowing that some piece of exchange rate variations are passed through prices and another piece are passed through specific markup sector. Methodology employed here includes vector error correction (VEC) estimation, one for export prices in dollar and other for import prices in reais, through which were calculated impulse response functions and forecast variance error decompositions for prices. Results point the validity of intermediate cases of LCP and PCP for Brazil. While Brazilian export prices in dollars are closer to LCP hypothesis, Brazilian import prices in reais are closer to PCP hypothesis. Other interesting aspects were obtained. For Brazilian export prices, the most important variable explaining it is the world economic growth. The second most important variable is the export sector cost. For Brazilian import prices in reais, both domestic economic growth and exchange rate are important in its determination, while import prices in dollars were not showed significant in the long run, but just in the short run.

Este trabalho investiga para o Brasil um dos mais importantes debates da literatura da Nova Macroeconomia Aberta: a escolha da moeda na qual a firma exportadora fixará os preços de seu produto vendido no exterior. Duas são as hipóteses possíveis: ou a firma exportadora fixa seu preço com base na sua própria moeda, conhecida como producer currency pricing (PCP),ou ela fixa seu preço com base na moeda do mercado de destino de seu produto, chamada de local currency pricing (LCP). Como muitos dos problemas verificados na literatura macroeconômica têm origem microeconômica, procuramos responder a questão através das observações encontradas na literatura de passthrough e pricing-to-market. Além disto, assumimos que, no agregado, os setores exportadores e importadores brasileiros se comportam como uma firma maximizadora de lucros que vende seus produtos para importadores locais. Isto permite que parte das variações cambiais seja repassada para os preços e parte seja absorvida pelo markup do setor. A metodologia empírica incluiu a estimação de dois VEC’s (vector error correction), um para as exportações e outro para as importações, pelos quais foram calculadas funções de resposta ao impulso e decomposições da variância dos erros de previsão nos preços. Os resultados obtidos indicam casos intermediários das hipóteses de LCP e PCP para o Brasil. Enquanto os preços em dólares das exportações brasileiras estão mais próximos da hipótese de LCP, os preços em reais das importações estão mais próximos da hipótese de PCP. Outros aspectos interessantes também foram observados. Para os preços das exportações brasileiras, a variável mais importante para sua determinação é a condição econômica do resto do mundo, seguida pelos custos do setor exportador. Já para as importações, tanto as condições econômicas domésticas quanto a taxa de câmbio são variáveis importantes, ao passo que os preços em moeda estrangeira das importações não se mostraram significantes no longo prazo, mas apenas no curto prazo. / This work analyzes to Brazil one of the most important debates on the New Open Economy Macroeconomic literature: the choice of the currency in which international prices are fixed. There are two possible hypotheses: either the export firm establishes his prices in your own currency, named producer currency pricing (PCP) or the export firm fix his price in the currency of the market in which his products is sold, named local currency pricing (LCP). Many questions treated in macroeconomic literature have microeconomic foundations. So we look for answering the question using the literature of passthrough and pricing-to-market. In addition to this, we assume that macroeconomic data for Brazilian’s export and import sectors are generated of profit maximizing firms’ behavior. The firms sell their products to local importers, allowing that some piece of exchange rate variations are passed through prices and another piece are passed through specific markup sector. Methodology employed here includes vector error correction (VEC) estimation, one for export prices in dollar and other for import prices in reais, through which were calculated impulse response functions and forecast variance error decompositions for prices. Results point the validity of intermediate cases of LCP and PCP for Brazil. While Brazilian export prices in dollars are closer to LCP hypothesis, Brazilian import prices in reais are closer to PCP hypothesis. Other interesting aspects were obtained. For Brazilian export prices, the most important variable explaining it is the world economic growth. The second most important variable is the export sector cost. For Brazilian import prices in reais, both domestic economic growth and exchange rate are important in its determination, while import prices in dollars were not showed significant in the long run, but just in the short run.

O fenômeno de hysteresis, originalmente estudado pela física, foi utilizado em economia na área de comércio internacional a fim de formular um modelo teórico que explicasse as diferentes reações do mercado a variações da taxa de câmbio. O objetivo desse trabalho é dar continuidade a literatura sobre o assunto e testar a hipótese de histerese para o mercado de importações brasileiro.Fez-se o uso da metodologia de painel com valores limiares a fim de testar se essa hipótese é válida para esse mercado analisando a equação de demanda brasileira por importações. Chegamos a conclusão que existem indícios de histerese nesse mercado quando analisamos os dados desagregados para os diferentes países que fazem parte da pauta de importação brasileira. / The hysteresis, originally studied by physics, has been used in economics in the area of international trade in order to formulate a theoretical model to explain the different market reactions to changes in the exchange rate. The aim of this work is to continue the literature on the subject and teste the hypothesis of hysteresis in the import market. It was used the panel with threshold values effect model in order to teste whether this hypothesis is valid. It is concluded that there is evidence of hysteresis in this market when analysing disaggregated data for different countries that are part of the Brazilian import agenda.