本文比較了臺灣南韓兩國自行車業的發展途徑，並說明它們成長模式與經濟表現的異同，而臺灣自行車業的表現一直都比南韓優異。自行車業的產業特性-無資產特定性-意味著運用市場的成本會比用內部組織來的低，亦即在競爭之下這產業不會是垂直整合的。在臺灣，當1971年左右美國訂單大批湧到之際，中小企業能大量及時湧現並形成零組件網路，是臺灣能夠建立領先地位之關鍵因素，南韓以大企業著稱，而大企業未能協助扶植一零組件網絡，直到1980年初政府大力介入協助扶植零組件網絡，南韓自行車業才開始快速成長，但時機已稍晚。這意味著對產業發展而言，產業結構不是最重要的因素，產業政策才是，在適當時機採行最適合的產業政策是促進產業發展的關鍵因素。

　　　　　This paper compares the development of the bicycle industry in Taiwan and South Korea, and accounts for the different growth pattern. The performance of the bicycle industry in Taiwan has been much better than that of its Korean counterpart. The transaction cost hypothesis helps to explain the advantage of the specialized system of parts production. Timely exergence of numerous small firms in Taiwan was crucial for its success, for it allowed the industry to achieve scale economies and specialization in both the assembling and parts sectors simultaneously since export growth began. The Korean large enterprise alone was not able to achieve that. The Korean government was successful in pusing the assembling and parts sectors at the same time in 1982-86, but recent development proved that the effort came somewhat too late, for the overall economic changes have rendered Korea unsuitable for labor-intensive industries in the late 1980s. It would be hard for other LDCs to emulate Taiwan's success; while the Korean case might be more relevant to other LDCs.