Suresh Narayanan: In general, this is a much improved version of the original paper. I will, however, highlight some remaining issues.
The topic of study has not been well situated against the background of existing Malaysian studies on the subject. The authors have made virtually no reference to existing Malaysian studies on technology transfer and linkages, except for two (Khalifah et al. 2009; Choo 2014). There are many more; making reference to them is important for two reasons. One, it would indicate an awareness of what has been done and how it was done. More importantly, it will help the reader better understand the need for the present study. In fact, the claim that this is the first study that empirically analyzes vertical spillovers through both backward and forward linkages from FDI in Malaysia carries little weight unless it can be shown that this approach is superior in some way...