Intellectual Capital and Value Creation in the Production and Assembly of Vehicles and Auto-Parts Sector in Brazil

This work investigates the relationship between intellectual capital and value creation in the sector of Production and Assembly of Vehicles and Auto-parts in Brazil. Through the access of the database from the Annual Industrial Research conducted by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics, we gathered 865 observations, from 2000 to 2006, of public and private Brazilian companies with more than 100 employees. The database allows the estimate of relevant aggregated variables such as national accounts, gross domestic product, intermediate consumption, as well as propitiates a sectorial study of business strategies and performance, including value added by individual companies. In particular, in this study we use data on variables associated to intellectual capital. To achieve the goal of the study, we consider intellectual capital as defined by Pulic (2000, 2002), including human capital and structural capital. For the analysis of business performance, we used Pulic's VAIC index as a measure of efficiency of the employed financial and intellectual capital. Regression models were run to verify the relationship among the efficiency in the use of intellectual capital and the profitability of Brazilian companies. The gross income, calculated as before selling, general and administrative expenses, depreciation expenses, amortization and interest expenses, was used as measure of the flows of value creation and the profitability was measured by the gross income to the total assets of the companies. Considering the constructs defined by Pulic (2000, 2002), we tested, for the Brazilian sector of Production and Assembly of Vehicles and Auto-parts, the following hypotheses: (i) there is a positive relationship between value creation and intellectual capital, (ii) there is a positive relationship between value creation and stock of intellectual capital, (iii) there is a positive relationship between value creation and efficiency of the employed capital, (iv) there is a positive relationship between value creation and efficiency of the human capital, (v) there is a positive relationship between value creation and efficiency of the structural capital. The results of the study, obtained through panel data analysis and through the use static and dynamic models, support the hypotheses that the intellectual capital of the companies, in its flow and stock dimensions, is positively and significantly related to value creation.