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Contents Introduction

This paper is intended to provide basic information related to the behavior and performance of Japanese multinational corporations (MNCs) in Indonesian manufacturing. Comparisons are also made for other Asian countries and other foreign countries using a plant-level dataset for Indonesian manufacturing and several firmlevel data sets with related information. Results of analyses suggest that Japanese plants account for large shares of employment and value added in Indonesian manufacturing, especially in metal products and all machinery categories. In the early 1990s, MNCs from other Asian home economies were concentrated in different industries, but the industrial distributions of MNCs from Japan and other Asian economies have become similar in recent years. However, MNCs from other Asian economies still tend to be more labor-intensive and dependent on exports than Japanese MNCs. These differences suggest that MNCs from different home economies might have different effects on Indonesian manufacturing.