new venture survival ignorance external shocks and risk reduction strategies abstract although scholars have long recognized the increased mortality risk that new ventures face in terms of a liability of newness most of the discussion around this risk has been in terms of the contextual constraints that new ventures face and the difficulties that managers have in overcoming them this emphasis is in part a reflection of the perils of newness but also stems from the retrospective and aggregate perspective taken by researchers although the macro level perspective of new venture mortality has made a significant contribution to our knowledge of mortality risk patterns there has been little interest in identifying how venture managers can address the risks that all new organizations face we argue that in order to make progress in explaining new venture survival a theoretical model is required that uses a more micro level perspective to explain new venture failure and the flip side new venture survival in this paper we develop such a model we establish a definition of mortality risk and argue that the liability of newness is largely dependent on the degree of novelty ignorance associated with a new venture novelty is viewed in three different dimensions viz to the market to the technology of production and to management novelty to the market concerns the degree to which the customers are uncertain about the new venture novelty in production concerns the extent to which the production technology used by the new venture is similar to the technologies in which the production team has experience and knowledge novelty to management concerns the entrepreneurial team s lack of business skills industry specific information and start up experience we argue that mortality risk increases with the degree of novelty in each dimension and with the number of dimensions in which the new venture is novel we propose that the decline in mortality risk occurs as the venture s novelty in each of the three dimensions is eroded by information search and dissemination processes this allows the new firm to become an established business and explains what we term the evolutionary path of mortality novelty and risk decline monotonically after a period of adolescence as ignorance decays over time due to passive learning we also propose that there is a strategic mortality risk path that reflects the impact of positive and negative shocks shocks are exogenous events that alter the overall degree of novelty at a point in time positive shocks decrease overall novelty while negative shocks increase overall novelty and reversals endogenous actions that increase the overall novelty of the new venture at a point in time on the mortality risk of a new venture if the incidence and effects of these disruptions can be managed then venture managers may be able to mitigate the mortality risk for their venture we argue that risk reduction strategies can be employed most of which impact on one or more of the dimensions of mortality risk in order to increase the firm s chances of survival a series of risk reduction strategies are proposed and their impact on the determinants of mortality risk is considered

national and organizational culture differences and international joint venture performance this study examines the effect of dimensions of national and organizational culture differences on international joint venture ijv performance based on data from a survey of executives from joint ventures between indian partners and partners from other countries we found that the presumed negative effect from culture distance on ijv performance originates more from differences in organizational culture than from differences in national culture

japanese and local partners commitment to ijvs psychological consequences of outcomes and investments in the ijv relationships this study investigated the antecedents of commitment in ijvs from the major partners perspective data were gathered from japanese and local partners in ijvs located in eleven countries and analyzed in structural equations models results indicated that commitment is largely a function of the perceived benefits of the relationship i e satisfaction and economic performance however exploration analyses of differences between local partners and the japanese suggest that the effects of psychological antecedents might be contingent on the strategic intent of the relationship

the impact of joint venture status on the longevity of japanese stakes in u s manufacturing affiliates a number of well known studies report that between one third and two thirds of international joint ventures eventually break up while many generalizations explanations and prescriptions have been based on these statistics their meaning is unclear first all foreign affiliates are subject to normal business risk and to the risk that they will be divested by parents for strategic or financial reasons are these risks higher for joint ventures than for wholly owned subsidiaries second joint ventures may be shorter lived not because of their joint venture status but because affiliates which are joint ventured have other characteristics that make them more likely to exit to know whether joint ventures are shorter lived one must control for the other factors that affect the longevity of affiliates whether wholly owned or joint ventured third many joint ventures contracts contain clauses that allow partners to sell their stakes to one another at specific intervals because they make exit easier joint ventures should have shorter lives but these shorter lives should only be due to sell offs not to liquidations it is therefore important to see whether the supposedly higher termination rate of joint ventures stakes is due to a higher rate of selloffs or to a higher rate of liquidations in this paper we 1 compare the longevity of stakes in joint ventures versus those in wholly owned subsidiaries 2 while controlling for other factors that affect the longevity of such stakes and 3 while distinguishing between two types of exit those through sale and those through liquidation while past authors have addressed these three issues in piecemeal fashion we believe we are the first to address them simultaneously we analyze the factors that affect the longevity of 355 japanese stakes in u s manufacturing affiliates controlling for all the factors that affect exit rates we find that japanese parents are more likely to terminate their stakes in u s joint ventures than in wholly owned subsidiaries this higher termination rate of joint venture stakes is explained by a higher probability of selling them but not of liquidating them most of the other factors that have been found significant in explaining gross divestment of foreign affiliates do in fact only affect exits through sales but not exits through liquidations hence it is true that joint ventures have shorter lives but dangerous to interpret this finding as necessarily meaning that they are more likely to fail

reply on comments on a quantity discount pricing model to increase vendor profits professor joglekar is to be thanked for his generally insightful comments 1988 concerning my paper monahan monahan j p 1984 a quantity discount pricing model to increase vendor points management sci 306 june 720 726 he has in my view correctly assessed the limitations of two important production assumptions i made assumptions which need to be rethought in any quantity discount pricing models of the future yet although i find myself in general agreement with joglekar s comments i wish to clarify some points concerning the model and its potential applicability

replenishment decisions under an all units discount schedule and stepwise freight costs in this study we analyze the replenishment decisions under a general replenishment cost structure that includes stepwise freight costs and all units quantity discounts we first formulate a general model that accounts for a larger class of problems and prove several useful properties of the expected profit function we later utilize these properties to develop a computational solution approach to find the optimal order quantity as an application of the general results we study the replenishment decisions in the single period i e the newsboy problem considering several scenarios that model the cost considerations either for the buyer or for both the buyer and the vendor

cooperative agreements and the theory of the firm focusing on barriers to change abstract cooperative agreements between firms have become a significant phenomenon in the 1980s and have been analyzed by various approaches including economics organizational theory and business strategy this paper draws on these different strands of the literature to argue that cooperative agreements have led to focus the analysis of firms organization on the issue of change as a consequence cooperative agreements have contributed to recent developments of the theory of the firm in favor of competence based and evolutionary approaches the analysis is then extended to the case of multinational firms

individualism collectivism private benefits of control and earnings management a cross culture comparison using private benefits of control and earnings management data from 41 countries and regions we provide strong evidence that cultures together with legal rules and law enforcement play a critical role in shaping corporate behavior more specifically we find that private benefits of control are larger and earnings management is more severe in collectivist as opposed to individualist cultures consistent with the argument that agency problems between corporate insiders and outside investors are severe in collectivist culture these results are robust to the inclusion of controls for country wealth economic heterogeneity across countries and international differences in ownership concentration

resources transactions and rents managing value through interfirm collaborative relationships this paper offers a theoretical explanation for why interfirm collaborations form yet fail and further suggests how firms might manage them for a more positive outcome based on a perspective of value we explain how a more inclusive and integrative perspective one which combines elements from transaction costs and resource based theory provides more robust insight into collaboration formation management and instability in doing so we differentiate rent yielding firm specific assets at the core of the resource based view from the transaction specific assets at the core of transaction cost theory the paper makes a crucial distinction between the potential value attainable through collaborations and its actual realization the crux of our argument is that firms enter into collaborative relationships because these are expected to yield superior value relative to alternate organizational forms in certain situations offering potentially synergistic combinations of complementary resources and capabilities yet such relationships are frequently prone to failure because the partner firms tend not to recognize ex ante the nature and extent of transaction specific investment that is required in the collaborative relationship to attain these synergies in our argument critically the relationship between organizations is seen not simply as a governance structure of a hybrid nature but more importantly as a productive resource for value creation and realization in this light transaction specific investment in what we term relational specificity becomes imperative in the search for value we explain why the transaction costs incurred in the exchange of resources are not independent of the nature of resources to be transacted and similarly why the returns realized from these resources are not independent of the relationship and transaction specific expenditures incurred in effectively combining them and maintaining the combination the interdependence between the two mediated by the quality of the relationship has direct implications for the earning of rents through collaborations these relationship specific expenditures can be of an internally generated nature endogenous to the alliance form itself and need not exceed alternative forms while the associated benefits have the capacity to potentially exceed the alternatives this translates into potentially superior value the paper contributes in three key related ways a the explicit recognition of the relationship as a value bearing asset embedded in a larger and endogenous institutional context namely a system of resource relationships both intraorganizational and inter organizational among partner firms and the collaboration b the recognition of the evolving relationship between production and exchange which at the level of the collaboration is directly dependent on the nature evolution and dynamics of the relationship among the parties to the transaction and c the provision of a nontrust explanation for why firms might knowingly forego opportunities to take advantage of their partners drawing from this the paper occasions a a shift in focus from the form to the process of governance which has direct implications for value creation and realization and b a shift in the primary identity of transaction specific and relationship specific expenditures from cost to investment in future value

from hybrids to hierarchies shareholder wealth effects of joint venture partner buyouts this study examines the parent firm performance implications of joint venture jv partner buyouts which involve the conversion of a hybrid governance structure to an internal unit within the firm s hierarchy transaction cost theory as developed and applied in the international literature and market entry research is extended to the post entry investment setting to isolate sources of value creation or dissipation from the governance changes effected by jv partner buyouts the evidence complements recent research on jv longevity and its determinants copyright 2001 john wiley sons ltd

towards a more balanced treatment of culture in international business studies the need for positive cross cultural scholarship the results of a content analysis of 1141 articles published in the journal of international business studies over a 24 year time period 1989 2012 reveal that a pervasive tendency exists in the international business ib literature towards emphasizing the adverse outcomes associated with cultural differences more than the positive effects we argue that this imbalance is not an accurate reflection of the reality of cross cultural contact in ib and that it has hindered our understanding of the processes and conditions that help organizations leverage the benefits of cultural differences in a wide range of contexts we offer several explanations for the predominance of the negative over the positive in theory and research on culture in ib and using a positive organizational scholarship lens couched in the context of march s 1991 exploration vs exploitation organizational learning framework highlight a complementary perspective namely the idea that cultural differences can be an asset not just a liability in a range of ib contexts we conclude by offering an integrative framework within which both positive and negative effects of cultural differences can be understood and provide a road map for future research on culture in ib

a classification of literature on determining the lot size under quantity discounts abstract determining a lot size in the presence of either all units or incremental discounts has represented one of major interests of materials managers it is a common practice that the suppliers offer quantity discount to entice the buyers to purchase more and to achieve economies of scale for transportation and processing costs this paper will classify the literature on lot sizing determination under several types of discount schemes and discuss some of the significant literature in this area over two decades also some future research areas have been identified

cultural friction in leadership beliefs and foreign invested enterprise survival cultural friction posits that cultural differences may be either synergistic or disruptive but does not specify when or how synergies or disruptions emerge we theorize that synergies will emerge in foreign invested enterprises fies when cultural differences in leadership beliefs are less central to the host nation s cultural identity while disruption will occur when differences are in more culturally central leadership beliefs analyzing survival data from 274 fies in china we found support for these hypotheses with five of the six globe leadership dimensions as predicted differences in the participative and team oriented dimensions were associated with higher firm death while differences in the charismatic autonomous and self protective dimensions were associated with firm survival our results indicate that while there are areas where differences may indeed need to be accepted or minimized there are other areas where differences can be beneficial this requires that managers identify more central aspects of local culture to determine whether to minimize differences or to leverage their synergistic potential

analysis and applications of replenishment problems under stepwise transportation costs and generalized wholesale prices abstract in this study we analyze the replenishment decision of a buyer with the objective of maximizing total expected profits the buyer faces stepwise freight costs in inbound transportation and a hybrid wholesale price schedule given by a combination of all units discounts with economies and diseconomies of scale this general cost structure enables the model and the proposed solution to be also used for the supplier selection of a buyer under the single sourcing assumption we show that the buyer s replenishment problem reduces to finding and comparing the solutions of the following two subproblems i a replenishment problem involving wholesale prices given by an all units discount schedule with economies of scale and a lower bound on the replenishment quantity and ii a replenishment problem involving wholesale prices given by an all units discount schedule with diseconomies of scale and an upper bound on the replenishment quantity we propose solution methods for these two subproblems each of which stands alone as practical problems and utilize these methods to optimally solve the buyer s replenishment problem

on the validity of aggregate models in designing supply chain contracts abstract the vast majority of the existing papers on supply chain contracts analyse these contracts based on a highly aggregate model description of the supply chain recognizing the high complexity of real supply chain systems such models can naturally only be rough approximations of reality out of the many possible ways for aggregating a planning model our study focuses on item aggregation here due to computational informational or organizational reasons a multi product reality is approximated by a model representation with fewer products we explore the aggregation error made when using an aggregate model in order to optimize a supply chain contract which is subsequently applied to a more detailed real system based on a numerical analysis it is shown that the design of supply chain contracts by means of an aggregate planning model may lead to significant suboptimalities

a bargaining model with asymmetric information for a single supplier single buyer problem abstract banerjee s joint economic lot size jels model represents one approach to minimizing the joint total relevant cost of a buyer and a supplier by using a joint optimal order and production policy the implementation of a jointly optimal policy requires coordination and cooperation should the buyer have the market power to implement his own optimal policy as that one to be used in the exchange process no incentive exists for him to choose a joint optimal policy a joint policy can therefore only be the result of a bargaining process between the parties involved the supplier may make some sort of concession such as a price discount or a side payment in order to influence the buyer s order policy a critical assumption made throughout in supply chain literature is that the supplier has complete knowledge about the buyer s cost structure clearly this assumption will seldom be fulfilled in practice the research presented in this paper provides a bargaining model with asymmetric information about the buyer s cost structure assuming that the buyer has the power to impose its individual optimal policy

clusters entrepreneurial ecosystem co creation and appropriability a conceptual framework extant literature on clusters underplays the role of entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial management in creating and co creating organizations markets and supporting ecosystems we employ transaction costs resource knowledge capabilities and power control based theories to provide a comparative static governance based perspective on clusters we embed this into a more general co evolutionary entrepreneurial theory of the emergence evolution and co evolution of markets ecosystems and clusters we suggest that clusters can involve advantages that help engender superior appropriation of co created value as compared to alternatives entrepreneurial managers faced with a degree of choice will help co create clusters and be part of them for as long as they can appropriate more value in this way than through alternatives

partner selection and venturing success the case of joint ventures with firms in the people s republic of china it has been hypothesized in the international joint venture ijv literature that partner selection affects interpartner fit which in turn influences a synergistic effect on ijv performance this study investigates the relationship between ijv success and the strategic and organizational traits of local partners we address this issue in the context of an emerging economy p r china newly emerging economies have in recent years become major hosts of direct investment by multinational corporations mncs because these rapidly expanding economies characterized by an exploding demand previously stifled by ideologically based government intervention provide tremendous opportunities which mncs can preempt mncs in such economies however face the challenges of structural reform weak market structure poorly specified property rights and institutional uncertainty right local partners can help mncs boost market expansion obtain insightful information mitigate operational risks and provide country specific knowledge the analysis of the data obtained from china suggests that both strategic and organizational traits of local partners are significantly associated with some individual dimensions of ijv performance among strategic traits absorptive capacity product relatedness and market power are favorable to ijvs market and financial outcomes market power and experience significantly reduce ijvs operational uncertainties of organizational traits international experience and organizational collaboration are important for ijvs not only profitability and stability but also local market expansion and export growth organizational form and size influence ijvs local market performance the findings provided by this study can help mncs determine what criteria they should use in opting for local partners and what criteria are vital to their goal accomplishment those investors seeking local market expansion should select those local partners that have rich market experience superior market position high absorptive capacity and related product diversification with the ijvs those seeking profitability and stability should select local firms that have superior international experience longer organizational collaboration and greater market power while mncs should use appropriate strategic and organizational criteria to select local partners the host government or local firms can try to make these traits available to attract more stable and profitable foreign direct investment

cross cultural interaction the international comparison fallacy international management studies have been based primarily on the comparison of managerial behavior in countries around the world often these studies have implied that business people behave similarly with their domestic colleagues as with their foreign counterparts in questioning that assumption this study tests whether intra cultural behavior accurately predicts cross cultural behavior using a negotiation simulation and a sample of 462 japanese american and canadian businesspeople behaviors in cross cultural negotiations were found to differ in some important ways from those in intra cultural negotiations

do country level institutional frameworks and interfirm governance arrangements substitute or complement in international business relationships interfirm relationships among partners from institutionally distant environments are subject to governance difficulties owing to the paucity of shared cognitive and regulatory frameworks we examine the potential of formal contracting and relational governance developed at the partnership level to overcome the formal and informal institutional gap at the country level empirical results from a sample of 184 international partnerships of large us firms support an overall substitutive relationship between informal institutional frameworks and interorganizational relational arrangements whereby the performance benefits of relational governance are reinforced at higher degrees of informal institutional distance contrastingly formal institutional frameworks and contractual governance are found to have a complementary relationship with performance gains from formal contracting undermined at higher degrees of formal distance

consequences of cultural practices for entrepreneurial behaviors although national culture is an important regulator of entrepreneurship there is a dearth of studies that 1 explore the effects of national cultural practices on entrepreneurial behaviors by individuals 2 use appropriate multilevel research designs 3 consider the effects of culture on different entrepreneurial behaviors such as entry and post entry growth aspirations we combined global entrepreneurship monitor gem and global leadership and organizational behavior effectiveness globe data from 42 countries for 2005 2008 to address these gaps using a multilevel design we found societal institutional collectivism practices negatively associated with entrepreneurial entry but positively associated with entrepreneurial growth aspirations uncertainty avoidance practices were negatively associated with entry but not with growth aspirations and performance orientation practices were positively associated with entry our analysis highlights the differential effects of cultural practices on entrepreneurial entry and growth aspirations and demonstrates the value of multilevel techniques in analyzing the effect of culture on entrepreneurship

cultural differences mne learning abilities and the effect of experience on subsidiary mortality in a dissimilar culture evidence from korean mnes in a departure from prior studies presuming a beneficial experience effect in foreign direct investment fdi the present paper examines the conditions under which fdi experience may actually harm subsequent subsidiaries we argue that multinational enterprises mnes may draw erroneous inferences and learn incorrectly from their early expansions when new to a dissimilar culture because their learning abilities are eroded by cultural differences we posit that the characteristics of an mne s international expansion including scope pace rhythm and entry mode moderate this negative experience effect by influencing the mne s learning ability in foreign cultures using a data set of fdis by south korean mnes between 1990 and 2006 we find a positive relationship between subsidiary mortality and experience when an mne has a low level of experience in a dissimilar culture this relationship is weaker if the mne s prior fdi has been dispersed across different cultures is stronger if it expanded internationally at a fast pace and becomes negative once the mne has accumulated a high level of experience in the host culture we conclude that when expanding into dissimilar cultures mnes must establish mechanisms to mitigate incorrect learning and reexamine the correctness of inferences drawn from past experience before applying them

outcome quality of small to medium sized enterprise based alliances abstract proponents of transaction cost theory have assumed that alliance formation is motivated by environmental uncertainty with the structure and outcomes of alliance relationships being determined by the costs versus benefits of opportunism on the part of alliance participants williamson 1985 zaheer and venkatraman 1995 williamson argued that cooperative relationships driven by perceived efficiency are inherently prone to opportunism or self interest seeking with guile 1975 p 6 in alliance relationships opportunism generally takes the form of negative departures from the behavioral norms established for the alliance and is usually motivated by the firm leader s desire to improve the firm s position regardless of the cost to the alliance parkhe 1993a the traditional focus of transaction cost theory has been on the norms established by the formal alliance relationship these contractual mandates encompass both goal based and relationship based expectations failure to meet these types of expectations significantly but not completely explains the quality of outcomes for alliance relationships a growing body of research on social control theory suggests that the social embeddedness of the alliance relationship may also establish behavioral norms against which opportunistic departures may be judged ouchi 1979 parkhe 1993b such norms are extracontractual or taken for granted expectations established by both the prior experience of the firms leaders and the placement of the firms alliance relationships within the network of interpersonal relationships maintained by the firms leaders this study explores the relative impact of negative departures from both contractual and extracontractual behavioral norms on the quality of alliance outcomes while controlling for a wide range of environmental and firm specific factors suggested to have an impact on alliance outcome quality norwegian manufacturing firms that met the study s size criteria and belonged to any one of 10 industry types were surveyed from a list of over 7 000 small to medium sized enterprises smes we randomly selected and mailed surveys to the key decision leaders of over 2 500 firms ultimately identifying of the 433 17 6 owners and general managers responding 252 58 that maintained alliance relationships the results of this study challenge several assumptions regarding the determinants of alliance outcomes a number of resource and environment based factors including the firm s industry size and financial strength are not found to significantly influence alliance outcomes the financial return provided by the sme s alliance relationships as an indicator of goal based determinants was found to be the most important factor related to outcome quality but the results also suggested that contract noncompliance and the perceived behaviors of the sme s alliance partners are significant as well additionally the notion that sme based alliance relationships are generally marked by assumptions of trust rather than opportunism was supported when partner behaviors are seen or perceived to be inconsistent with either contractually mandated or socially obligated expectations the outcomes of those relationships are negatively effected even when the financial goals have been met an additional finding of this study was that firm leaders make judgments regarding the quality of alliance outcomes in light of their cumulative experience with alliance relationships

the trap of continual ownership change in international equity joint ventures this article examines how multiple ownership changes unfold in international equity joint venture iejv evolution and how such repeated changes impact short term performance and long term survival by theorizing a new concept the trap of continual change in the iejv context we challenge the adaptive viewpoint assumed in alliance dynamics research we propose that partners sometimes respond to an initial dissatisfaction with the venture result with a dysfunctional repetition of rearranging the ownership control structure this continual change locks the organization into bad choices and sends it into a downward spiral acknowledging the mixed motive nature of inter partner relationships we incorporate cooperative versus competitive dynamics manifested in shared control arrangements we propose that shared ownership control lends stability to the iejv until the initial iejv agreement is renegotiated this stability is a result of the cooperative forces of mutual interdependence and mutual forbearance between the partners however when the power balance breaks down the potential for inter partner conflict increases when the ownership control structure of the iejv is restructured especially multiple times shared control arrangements become increasingly unstable as behavioral cultural and managerial differences are amplified

a model of cultural differences and international alliance performance we propose a model of cultural differences and international alliance performance to explain the ambiguous findings regarding the influence of national culture differences on alliance performance building on research on national organizational and professional cultures we argue that the closer the domain of a social group is to the value creating activities of an alliance the more disruptive cultural differences between the partners members of that social group will be organizational culture differences will tend to be more disruptive than national culture differences and differences in the professional culture most relevant to alliance value creation typically will be the most disruptive implications for research and managerial practice are discussed and the model s relevance for international r d alliances is highlighted

transactional characteristics institutional environment and joint venture contracts this study examines how transactional characteristics and the institutional environment influence contractual governance for international joint ventures ijvs unlike previous studies that view joint venture contractual governance as a unidimensional construct clause specificity thus causing a debate upon whether ijv contracts should be more specific contractual governance herein is defined as a three dimensional construct that includes the extent to which contractual terms are clearly specified term specificity possible contingencies are accounted for contingency adaptability and joint venture parties are legally bound to the contract contractual obligatoriness our analysis of ijvs in china suggests that term specificity and contractual obligatoriness increase when the proprietariness of resources to be invested in the ijv or the incompleteness of the host country s legal system increase contractual obligatoriness appears to be an increasing function of economic exposure and environmental volatility whereas contingency adaptability in a contract rises when interparty dependency investment uncertainty and knowledge proprietariness intensify or when environmental hazards escalate these results suggest that an ijv contract if structured multidimensionally as above can curtail opportunism and guide venture evolution at the same time these contractual dimensions should not be prefixed but properly aligned with transactional and institutional characteristics this alignment has strong implications in reducing transaction costs and spurring ijv evolution in the complex and volatile institutional environment

cultural differences and cross border venture capital syndication we examine cross border syndication in investments led by foreign venture capitalists vcs focusing on the potential correlation between cultural differences and the formation of vc syndicates contrary to the risk sharing motive we find that a greater cultural disparity between the countries of investors and their companies is actually associated with smaller vc syndicates this is driven largely by lesser local investor representation in foreign vc led syndicates however certain cultural disparity related syndication strategies such as the involvement of locally experienced foreign vcs or syndicate members from culturally similar countries are associated with greater presence of local vcs who provide valuable monitoring services we further show that these culture linked syndication approaches are significantly correlated with vc financing and monitoring strategies in cross border investments and their eventual success

coordination mechanisms of supply chain systems supply chain management scm has become an important management paradigm as supply chain members are often separate and independent economic entities a key issue in scm is to develop mechanisms that can align their objectives and coordinate their activities so as to optimize system performance in this paper we provide a review of coordination mechanisms of supply chain systems in a framework that is based on supply chain decision structure and nature of demand this framework highlights the behavioral aspects and information need in the coordination of a supply chain the identification of these issues points out several directions of future research in this area

the influence of culture on the process of business negotiations an exploratory study the processes of business negotiations in three countries the united states japan and brazil are compared and contrasted three dyads from each country were videotaped during a buyer seller negotiation simulation both verbal behaviors and nonverbal behaviors were observed and recorded observed differences provide the basis for hypothesized differences which might be tested in future work

public education expenditures and state economic growth northeast and sunbelt regions the level of educational services may affect economic growth in a state in two distinct ways first potential migrants may be concerned with the quality of education that their children will receive in that state to the extent that a growing population contributes to economic growth increasing both the supply of labor and the demand for local goods educational spending may contribute to growth by attracting people to the state we call this the parental migration effect the extensive empirical literature based on the tiebout model has shown that local school expenditures affect choice of residence among school districts within metropolitan areas readers may be more skeptical of our hypothesis that educational expenditures affect interstate location choices but support for our hypothesis is found in cebula 3 and herzog and schlottmann 8 cebula showed that net migration into metropolitan areas was higher in the metropolitan areas with the higher rates of growth in education spending herzog and schlottmann found that education expenditures per student had a negative effect on the likelihood of out migration from metropolitan areas since children frequently attend college outside the state in which their parents reside but seldom attend elementary or secondary schools away from their parents home local k 12 elementary and secondary educational spending may have a more significant parental migration effect than state spending on higher education although herzog and schlottmann 8 did find a significant effect of higher education options second education may increase the productivity of workers this productivity effect should raise wage rates in a state whereas the migration effect will primarily affect aggregate income by increasing the population the productivity effect may also be distinguished from the migration effect by a longer time lag improving the quality of higher education will only begin to raise the productivity of the labor force four years later when the better trained students graduate from college improved elementary and secondary education will not begin to have an impact for 4 to 9 years there is an extensive literature estimating the impacts of education on individual earn

revisiting foundations in lot sizing connections between harris crowther monahan and clark abstract while many review articles exist on deterministic lot sizing models used in the context of price and quantity discounts buyer vendor coordination supply chain management and joint economic lot sizing problems they do not convey the impact of important findings which date back to at least 2002 or in hindsight to 1984 as a result many recent articles still model the financial implications of lot sizing decisions without having the assurance that these models would help the firm s involved in maximising the net present value npv this paper therefore reviews these findings while adding also its own contributions as to convey the general importance to lot sizing theory we show that the underlying principles used in the four key articles that have led to a division in modelling approaches are in fact all in line with npv and argue that therefore there should not be these discrepancies that currently persist in the literature we establish the connections between these four strands of the literature using the solution to a simple variation of harris eoq model deriving thereby results from boyaci and gallego 2002 and beullens and janssens 2011 but showing their general applicability to any type of supply chain structure the breath of implications to deterministic lot sizing theory is illustrated using practical examples we present a stochastic version of the model of crowther 1964 which is arguably the least understood and applied model but on the other hand the most important one in realising how these modelling strands can be unified

the characteristics and performance of korean joint ventures in ldcs little has been reported on joint ventures between firms from newly industrialized countries and developing countries this paper examines twelve characteristics of a sample of korean firms with partners in developing countries ldcs and contrasts them with existing research where a developed country firms have linked with firms in other developed countries and b developed country firms have linked with local firms in developing countries as part of the analysis ten hypotheses were formulated and tested

performance and survival of joint ventures with non conventional ownership structures the international joint venture jv literature has focused on two parent jvs formed between one foreign and one local firm yet other types of jvs exist this paper identifies four distinct forms of jvs based on the jv partners nationality and equity affiliation these are i jvs that are formed between affiliated home country based firms ii jvs that are formed between unaffiliated home country based firmsl iii jvs that are formed between home country based and local firms and iv jvs that are formed between home country and third country based firms our analysis of 737 japanese jvs in asia demonstrates that the conventionally assumed form of jv represented only 30 percent of the total further each of the four jv forms significantly differed in terms of incidence performance and survival likelihood

attitudes toward cooperative strategies a cross cultural analysis of entrepreneurs because entrepreneurs mature within a societal context their attitudes toward cooperation are likely to be influenced by the underlying values of their society using a seven nation sample we find that entrepreneurs from feminine collective and uncertainty avoiding societies have a greater appreciation for the strategic importance of cooperative strategies than their counterparts moreover entrepreneurs from feminine societies place greater emphasis on partner commonality in terms of objectives and values to ensure cooperative success whereas those from individualistic societies emphasize contractual safeguards

the effects of social capital and organizational innovativeness in different institutional contexts this paper examines how social capital and organizational innovativeness influence business performance through their separate indirect or interactive effects and how these effects differ across the institutional contexts of a transition economy and a market economy in line with institutional theory our findings show that the effects of social capital are more extensive and probably more malignant in a transition economy than in a market economy furthermore different types of organizational innovativeness as corporate culture can be cultivated by different forms of social capital in different institutional contexts the implications for institutional theory and social capital theory and the managerial implications are discussed

does social trust affect international contracting evidence from foreign bond covenants abstract building on rational choice institutionalism theory and williamson s j econ lit 38 3 595 613 2000 four level social analysis framework we investigate the influence of the informal institution of social trust on debt contract design in an international setting using a sample of non u s firms that issue bonds in the u s debt market we find that yankee bond creditors impose fewer covenants on bond issuers domiciled in countries with a high degree of social trust we further show that the inverse relationship between debt covenants and the informal institution of social trust is more pronounced for firms from countries with weak formal institutions as well as for firms with poor corporate governance and greater information opacity these findings are robust to endogeneity tests within country analysis various empirical models and measures of trust and alternative hypotheses we also show that while a lower level of informal social trust is associated with higher borrowing costs this relationship weakens when formal covenants are added to the debt contract i e a substitution effect our paper contributes to the international business literature by providing new insights into the role of informal institutions social trust in cross border debt contracting

determinants of success in international strategic alliances evidence from the global aerospace industry this paper presents the results of a study linking the performance of international joint ventures and alliances set up in the global aerospace industry to their strategic and organizational features in a first stage an empirically based taxonomy of the observed alliances is generated then the economic performance of various types of alliances is evaluated on the basis of industry expert opinions and the difference in performance of different alliance types is tested

models for multi plant coordination abstract this paper addresses coordination of production planning among multiple plants in a vertically integrated firm currently there is no unified body of literature that deals with this issue we identify important issues that managers and researchers must address so that production and inventory decisions can be determined for all plants in a manner optimal for the organization as a whole

the effect of national culture on the choice of entry mode characteristics of national cultures have frequently been claimed to influence the selection of entry modes this article investigates this claim by developing a theoretical argument for why culture should influence the choice of entry two hypotheses are derived which relate culture to entry mode choice one focusing on the cultural distance between countries the other on attitudes towards uncertainty avoidance using a multinomial logit model and controlling for other effects the hypotheses are tested by analysing data on 228 entries into the united states market by acquisition wholly owned greenfield and joint venture empirical support for the effect of national culture on entry choice is found

interfirm diversity organizational learning and longevity in global strategic alliances organizational theorists have correctly argued that the emergence and maintenance of robust cooperation between global strategic alliance partners is related to the diversity in the partners characteristics yet previous research has failed to systematically delineate the important dimensions of interfirm diversity and integrate the dimensions into a unified framework of analysis this paper develops a multilevel typology of interfirm diversity and focuses on organizational learning and adaptation as critical processes that dynamically moderate diversity s impact on alliance longevity and effectiveness

non cooperative strategies for production and shipment lot sizing in one vendor multi buyer system abstract this paper considers a decentralized dynamic production distribution control a discrete deterministic model in which a vendor produces a product and supplies it to the buyer is considered several papers on vendor buyer integrated production inventory management assume that policies are set by a central decision maker to optimize total system performance although vendor and buyer may agree to minimize the total cost at least one of them has a private incentive to deviate from the agreement in the competitive situation the objective is to determine schedules which minimize the individual average total cost of production shipment and stockholding we assume that the division of shipment costs is centrally coordinated or negotiated initially it leads to a class of non cooperative constrained games indexed by two parameters connected with partitions of shipment costs non cooperative strategies are considered as feasible strategies in a restricted non cooperative game some properties of equilibrium strategies are investigated as acceptable equilibrium strategies of subgames in the game

control cooperation interfaces in global strategic alliances a situational typology and strategic responses this article applies the dialectical logic of loose coupling to interpartner exchanges in order to analyze the dynamics of global strategic alliances we develop a typology of control and cooperation that defines alliance states or situations according to their level of cooperation under private and collective control in the private control cooperation interplay contending honeymoon and coopetition situations arise depending on the levels of private control and cooperation in the collective control cooperation interplay the loosely connected the equity hostage the tightly integrated and the trusting states emerge according to the levels of collective control and cooperation we illustrate how an individual partner strategically responds to the control cooperation interplay under each situation or state and develop hypotheses explicating how these strategic responses are influenced by relational characteristics such as goal congruity resource complementarity and bargaining asymmetry between foreign and local partners

built to last or meant to end intertemporal choice in strategic alliance portfolios a salient but rarely explicitly studied characteristic of interfirm relationships is that they can intentionally be formed for finite periods of time what determines firms intertemporal choices between different alliance time horizons shadow of the future theorists suggest that when an alliance has an explicitly set short term time frame there is an increased risk that partners may behave opportunistically this does not readily explain the high incidence of time bound alliances being formed reconciling insights from the shadow of the future perspective with nascent research on the flexibility of temporary organizations and shifting the focus from the level of individual transactions to that of strategic alliance portfolios we argue that firms may be willing to accept a higher risk of opportunism when there are offsetting gains in strategic flexibility in managing their strategic alliance portfolio consequently we hypothesize that environmental factors that increase the need for strategic flexibility namely dynamism and complexity in the environment are likely to increase the relative share of time bound alliances in strategic alliance portfolios our analysis of longitudinal data on the intertemporal alliance choices of a large sample of small and medium sized enterprises provides support for this argument our findings fill an important gap in theory about time horizons in interfirm relationships and temporary organizations and show the importance of separating planned terminations from duration based performance measures

a note on countertrade contractual uncertainty and transaction governance in emerging economies this paper develops a conceptual framework for analyzing organizational responses to contractual uncertainty in the context of emerging economies elaborating on hennart s 1989 transaction cost rationale for countertrade we develop a typology of exchange and transaction governance pertinent to the study of emerging economies contract trust and hostage notwithstanding the traditional explanation based on foreign exchange shortage we argue that the persistence of international countertrade illustrates organizational remedies to institutional deficiency in transaction governance

a one vendor multi buyer integrated inventory model abstract we consider a one vendor multi buyer integrated inventory model the vendor seeks to minimize his total annual cost subject to the maximum costs which buyers are prepared to incur in order to implement this model the vendor only needs to know buyer s annual demand and previous order frequency which can be inferred from buyer s past ordering behavior we find the optimal solution for the one vendor one buyer case and present a heuristic approach for the one vendor multi buyer case

learning from competing partners outcomes and durations of scale and link alliances in europe north america and asia this paper investigates the outcomes and durations of strategic alliances among competing firms using alliance outcomes as indicators of learning by partner firms we show that alliance outcomes vary systematically across link and scale alliances link alliances are interfirm partnerships to which partners contribute different capabilities while scale alliances are partnerships to which partners contribute similar capabilities we find that partners are more likely to reorganize or take over link alliances than scale alliances by contrast scale alliances are more likely to continue without material changes the two types of alliances are equally likely to shut down at similar ages these results support the view that link alliances lead to greater levels of learning and capability acquisition between the partners than do scale alliances copyright 2000 john wiley sons ltd

buyer supplier relations in industrial markets when do buyers risk making idiosyncratic investments it is well established that the existence of investments specific to a relationship influences the choice of governance structure including the use of contractual safeguards what is less well understood are the circumstances leading to the creation of those specific assets to begin with this paper explores the industrial buyer s motives to put itself at risk by making investments tangible and intangible which cannot be readily redeployed from one supplier to another using original data from a sample of 388 supply relationships involving all automakers in the u s and japan we examine features of the supply task the supplier and the supply environment which serve as motives to make supplier specific investments we also examine potential factors which facilitate the posting of specific assets as credible commitments to attenuate supplier opportunism we find that specific investments by buyers serve as a mechanism to 1 increase coordination when the manufacturing task is complex 2 buffer the buyer against technological uncertainty and 3 build close relationships when the requisite production skills are scarce the supply market is thin we find more specific investments in supply arrangements that are embedded in a broader business relationship we find fewer supplier specific investments in the japanese context finally we find that buyers focus their investments on lesser known low share component makers perhaps to capitalize on a unique focused supplier capability

migration and the public sector a survey charney a h 1993 migration and the public sector a survey reg studies 27 3133 326 a review of the existing literature on human migration reveals relatively few studies that explicitly examine the relationships between public policy decisions and human migration flows the surveyed literature includes studies of national policies such as defence spending migration subsidies and intergovernmental transfers as well as sub national policies such as welfare and unemployment benefits state and local taxes education and other public services suggestions for incorporating public sector information into existing migration analysis frameworks and further areas of research are provided charney a h 1993 la migration et le secteur public une etude reg studies 27 313 326 faire la critique de la documentation disponible sur la migration humaine laisse voir que rares sont les etudes traitant explicitement des rapports entre la politique d etat et les flux migratoires la documentation examinee c

measuring performance of international joint ventures international joint ventures ijvs are increasing in frequency and strategic importance however efforts to identify variables associated with ijv performance have been constrained by disagreements regarding the comparability and reliability of alternative performance measures and methods this study tests several hypotheses regarding the reliability and comparability of a range of objective and subjective measures of ijv performance as well as evaluating the relative utility of different data collection approaches

parent firm performance across international joint venture life cycle stages the benefits that firms obtain from investing in international joint ventures ijvs can be reinforced or reduced by the management of later stages of collaboration this paper presents an analysis of the shareholder wealth effects of ijv formation and five types of ijv termination the empirical findings challenge common assumptions in the ijv literature contrast prior evidence on the performance implications of market entry and exit through acquisitions and divestitures and demonstrate the value of integrating ijv life cycle stages in future research

dynamic decision making a cross cultural comparison of u s and peruvian export managers export managers from the u s and peru completed a survey designed to measure cooperative decisions during a sequence of three simulated interactions with business partners during the initial stage of the relationship the decisions of peruvian export managers reflect less trust than do those of their u s counterparts during the second stage peruvian exporters respond differently to weak cheating results generally are consistent with cultural differences in attitudes toward in group v out group members however the influence of cultural differences gradually erodes in favor of personal characteristics and relationship specific history suggesting that cultural differences between business partners decline in importance as they get to know each other

note on a quantity discount pricing model to increase vendor profits monahan monahan james p 1984 a quantity discount pricing model to increase vendor profits management sci 30 june 720 726 develops a model for establishing an optimal quantity discount schedule from a vendor s viewpoint in this note we show that this model is limited to the case where the vendor buys from another supplier incorporating vendor s inventory carrying costs we develop a generalized version of monahan s model and demonstrate its equivalence with the joint economic lot size approach suggested by banerjee banerjee avijit 1986 a joint economic lot size model for purchaser and vendor decision sci 17 summer 292 311

two echelon supply chain coordination through the unified number of annual orders abstract this paper studies the problem of how to coordinate a one supplier multi retailer supply chain by requiring retailers to adopt the unified number of annual orders proposed by the supplier the paper presents two coordination models one considering a small number of retailers the other considering a large number of retailers in the proposed models the supplier views all retailers or some selected retailers if more beneficial in the supply chain as one group then offers a price discount to entice the retailers in this group placing their orders only with the specific number of annual orders a heuristic is developed for each model to let the supplier know which retailers will be selected to implement the common number of annual orders and how to determine the corresponding optimal number of annual replenishments and price discount by using a numerical study we evaluate the benefit of the proposed coordination strategy

adapting inventory models for handling various payment structures using net present value equivalence analysis beullens patrick univ southampton southampton so17 1bj hants england janssens gerrit k univ southampton southampton sch management southampton so17 1bj hants england janssens gerrit k hasselt univ res grp logist b 3590 diepenbeek belgium

revisiting multinational firms tolerance for joint ventures a trust based approach in spite of the increasing popularity of international joint ventures managers express a high level of dissatisfaction with them this paper argues that overemphasis on the outcome has resulted in a neglect of the social processes underlying the outcome the paper elaborates upon the rationale for a cooperative approach towards interorganizational collaborative relationships based on trust and discusses it in the context of joint ventures this is then applied towards understanding multinational ownership preferences and tolerance for joint ventures it is argued that trust centered logic is largely consistent with approaches that emphasize the issue of ownership and deepens and enriches the insights provided by the latter a shift in focus from ownership to relational dynamics is encouraged

letter from the editor in chief time in international business issue 40 4 consists of eight articles seven of which were acceptedfor publication by former jibs editor in chief arie y lewin andone under my watch while each of the articles makes importantcontributions to our knowledge of international business ib studies i would like to highlight those that are related to time time in ibeconomists think of time in terms of statics comparative staticsand dynamics static analyses focus on equilibrium situations e g the price where quantity demanded equals quantity supplied comparative statics focuses on pre vs post situations when anexogenous change affects behavior and outcomes e g changes inincome or tastes affect market price dynamic analyses trace thepath or processes for beginnings transitions and endings whetheralone or in a coevolutionary framework much and perhaps most ib research either ignores time orfocuses solely on the comparative statics of predicting how achange in the business environment or government policies attime t affects mne strategies and performance at time t

in search of complementary assets the determinants of alliance formation of high tech start ups abstract why do new technology based firms ntbfs cooperate starting from teece s teece d j 1986 profiting from technological innovation implications for integration collaboration licensing and public policy research policy 15 285 305 conceptual framework and taking advantage of subsequent literature on alliance formation in the resource and competence based tradition and in the social structure perspective we derive an empirical model that aims at highlighting the inducements and obstacles that these firms face in alliance formation according to firm specific characteristics and the nature of the alliance in particular a distinction is made between exploitative commercial alliances and explorative technological alliances the econometric estimates based on a large sample of italian young high tech firms that are observed from 1994 to 2003 provide strong evidence supporting two key intuitions of teece s work first the combination of specialized complementary assets appears to be a key driver of the formation of exploitative commercial alliances by ntbfs more specifically patent holding affects positively the likelihood to establish commercial alliances but this propensity is found to rapidly decrease with firm size suggesting that as long as ntbfs become larger and possess specialized commercial assets their urge for commercial alliances diminishes second following the parallelism set forth by teece between search for alliance partners and access to external financing the analysis indicates that potentially beneficial alliances may not take place because of the high transaction costs faced by smaller ntbfs in this respect our results clearly support the view that sponsor institutions as public research organizations venture and corporate venture capitalists may sensibly reduce these costs and that their role crucially depends on both the identity of the sponsor and the type of alliance

holding costs under push or pull conditions the impact of the anchor point holding costs are traditionally determined from the investment in physical stock during a cycle an alternative approach instead derives holding costs from net present value npv functions it is known that applying both frameworks to the same system can lead to different holding cost valuations but little explanation has been offered by introducing the anchor point in a model this paper shows for four different systems that traditional holding cost models implicitly assume pull conditions while current npv approaches model push conditions this explains in part the differences between the methods it is shown that the anchor point concept allows the construction of npv models under pull conditions giving results in better correspondence with traditional models the traditional framework is restricted to pull conditions and important considerations could be easily overlooked leading to wrong valuations of holding costs npv seems superior as such considerations are automatically incorporated the application to multi echelon inventory systems provides interesting insights on the roles of echelon stocks and lead times and offers potential for future research

the effect of state and local taxes on economic development a meta analysis economists and policy makers have long questioned the effect of state and local taxes on economic development according to schmenner 55 economists have long argued that taxes had little impact on business location decisions while development practitioners and elected officials ignored this advice and aggressively pursued development by using tax incentives more recent research using improved data and methodologies has begun to show that taxes can make a difference and the emerging consensus among economists now says that taxes do matter this changing view among researchers is perhaps best exemplified in a 1991 study by timothy j bartik 2 bartik examined 84 econometric studies completed since 1979 which assess the impact of state and local taxes on economic growth in the u s he concluded that the long run elasticity of business activity with respect to state and local taxes was between 10 and 60 for studies focusing on intermetropolitan or interstate business economic activity and between 1 0 and 3 0 for intrametropolitan areas however bartik s study did not control for a variety of study characteristics that may have influenced the measured elasticity this study builds upon bartik s analysis by performing a meta analysis of the studies bartik reviewed meta analysis is a method for statistically analyzing results across empirical studies though it has been little used by economists researchers in psychology education and health sciences have used meta analysis extensively this study uses a meta analytic technique suggested by stanley and jarrell 57 to analyze the studies reviewed by bartik the technique yields increased precision for our understanding of the relationship between state and local taxes and economic development the objective of this study is two fold first to derive a more precise estimate of the tax elasticity and second to determine how the inclusion and omission of key variables in the estimated equations influences the elasticity estimates

split management control and international joint venture performance a framework is presented to characterize four different ways in which management control is partitioned between a multinational enterprise mne and local partners within international joint ventures jvs split control management shared management mne partner dominant management and local partner dominant management the framework was tested using a sample of international jvs in korea we found that jvs following the split control management performed better than any other approach no performance differences were found among the remaining three types of management control this suggests that mnes and local partners should split control that is choose the activities to control so that those chosen activities can be matched with their respective firm specific advantages

all units quantity freight discounts with disposals abstract this paper examines the effect of various freight rate structures and quantity discounts on the inventory policies of roi and profit maximizing firms with downward sloping price elastic demand lot sizing policies and price set at a markup on unit cost units not sold at the regular price are disposed of at a reduced price both the markup and the order quantity are decision variables numerical examples are used throughout to illustrate the properties of the model and the sensitivity of the optimal solutions to fluctuations in the parameters

entrepreneurship and growth the strategic use of external resources abstract a common characteristic of entrepreneurial farms is fast growth a common problem for their managers is obtaining enough resources to accommodate that growth a typical entrepreneur either individual or corporate often desires to pursue a detected opportunity but lacks the necessary resources to make it happen again gaining access to those resources becomes the first entrepreneurial problem one of the most efficient weapons used by entrepreneurial firms to gain market share from larger more powerful corporations is their flexibility but the progressive accumulation of resources that growth often entails brings almost necessarily a loss of that very flexibility that made the firm successful in the first place this can be termed the second entrepreneurial dilemma networking practices are a way to overcome these problems essentially networking is a system by which entrepreneurs can tap resources that are external to them i e that they don t control in its simplest form networking consists of the use of all personal relationships to obtain advice financing insider sales etc birley 1986 in its most sophisticated form entrepreneurs set up an elaborate web of relationships between companies most of them of similar entrepreneurial characteristics that are extremely efficient and flexible at delivering a product or service in all cases we find that the ability to exploit resources that are outside the entrepreneur s control is a constant of entrepreneurial high growth management this is why entrepreneurs have been defined as being primarily motivated by the pursuit of opportunities as opposed to those managers exclusively concerned with the proper management of the resources already controlled by their firm stevenson 1983 stevenson and gumpert 1985 this paper proposes a view whereby the essence of entrepreneurship is seen precisely in the ability and willingness to use external resources a statistical validation of the main hypothesis i e that entrepreneurial fast growing firms do use more external resources than their competitors is then attempted the results strongly support the hypothesis it is found that the fastest growing firms in a very large sample of public companies are much less integrated make more use of external resources than their competitors in addition those firms that are at the forefront of using external resources grow on average much faster more than 10 every year than their competitors over a long period of time ten years this study s implication for managers seems clear it constitutes yet another piece of evidence in favor of the efficiency of networking arrangements being flexible enough to use external resources allows the entrepreneurial firm to break through the limits to sustainable growth and at the same time lowers its risk for it taps into someone else s experience and know how entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial managers must not be deterred by the lack of resources in the pursuit of opportunities

the influence of the management team s international experience on the internationalization behaviors of smes why are some small and medium sized enterprises smes more successful in selling outside their domestic markets than are other smes in the same industry although the traditional explanation is that firms can gain valuable knowledge and resources as they become older and larger small and young firms are not necessarily disadvantaged if they develop other mechanisms to acquire the requisite knowledge and resources we examine the role of the management team s international experience as such a mechanism for the internationalization of canadian software product firms we show that internationally experienced management teams have a greater propensity to develop foreign strategic partners and to delay less in obtaining foreign sales after start up and that these behaviors are associated with a higher degree of internationalization

national institutional structures transaction cost economizing and competitive advantage the case of japan japan s economic success since world war ii has been striking modern japan was the first major industrial economy to emerge from outside the western tradition economically devastated in 1945 by 1990 japan had the world s second largest economy and a gdp per head 20 percent greater than that of the united states in this paper it is argued that one reason for japan s success is that the costs of achieving cooperation and specialization are lower in japan than in the west cooperation and specialization have been acknowledged to have a beneficial impact upon productivity ever since adam smith wrote about cooperative specialization in the context of the division of labor modern economic theory however suggest that in a world of self interested individuals the costs of achieving cooperation and specialization are substantial in this paper it is argued that the cultural value system that japan has inherited from its preindustrial past and particularly the tokugawa period helps facilitate cooperation b

cultural differences and capability transfer in cross border acquisitions the mediating roles of capability complementarity absorptive capacity and social integration this paper presents an integrative model of the impact of cultural differences on capability transfer in cross border acquisitions we propose that cultural differences affect the post acquisition capability transfer through their impact on social integration potential absorptive capacity and capability complementarity two dynamic variables the use of social integration mechanisms and the degree of operational integration of the acquired unit are proposed to moderate the effects of cultural differences on social integration and potential absorptive capacity the implications for acquisition research and practice are discussed

game theoretic pricing and ordering decisions with partial lost sales in two stage supply chains abstract few papers have studied the optimal pricing and ordering with partial lost sales from a two stage game theoretic perspective this paper considers a supply chain game with a buyer and a seller through pricing and ordering models with partial lost sales we evaluate the optimal solutions for the buyer and the seller and provide insights into both the deterministic and stochastic demand models we also propose search algorithms to obtain the global optimum when convexity and concavity conditions are not satisfied