determining optimal lot size for a two warehouse system with deterioration and shortages using net present value abstract in this paper we develop a deterministic inventory model for deteriorating items with two warehouses by minimizing the net present value of the total cost deterioration rates of items in the two warehouses may be different in addition we allow for shortages and complete backlogging we then prove that the optimal replenishment policy not only exists but also is unique under some condition further the result reveals that the reorder interval based on the average total cost if it exists must be longer than that derived using net present value finally we use yang s h l yang european journal of operational research 157 2004 344 356 numerical example to illustrate the model and conclude the paper with suggestions for possible future research

the liability of localness in innovation i analyze differences in the innovativeness of domestic firms and subsidiaries of foreign firms operating in the same country i argue that domestic firms suffer a liability of localness in innovation or a competitive disadvantage in product innovation relative to subsidiaries of foreign firms i propose that this liability of localness is driven by the relatively lower levels of multiculturalism in employees of domestic firms in comparison with subsidiaries which limit the identification transfer and integration of a large diversity of knowledge that supports product innovation i also propose that managers of domestic firms can compensate for this liability of localness in two ways by investing in the training of their employees and by exporting training modifies the mindsets and abilities of employees and enables them to become more cognitively multicultural which facilitates product innovation exporting changes employees mindsets as they become exposed to new ideas available abroad which also facilitates product innovation i test these arguments on a sample of manufacturing firms and find that although domestic firms introduce fewer new products than subsidiaries of foreign firms they introduce more new products than subsidiaries at the same level of investment in language training and of exports

the translation of corporate governance changes across national cultures the case of germany contrasting systems of corporate governance persist internationally but are subject to regulatory and firm level institutional change such changes may be viewed as organisational innovations often imported from the usa in the face of different national cultures this paper analyses the implications of national culture for the translation of innovations and provides case study illustrations of regulatory and firm level governance changes experienced in germany these illustrations demonstrate that the diffusion of both kinds of change has been subject to substantial translation that is consistent with german national culture

stickiness and the adaptation of organizational practices in cross border knowledge transfers the reuse of organizational practices in multiple locations is a fundamental way in which mncs leverage knowledge to seek competitive advantage scholars approaching the issue of adaptation from both a market and an institutional perspective argue that in order to achieve fit with the local environment some degree of adaptation is advisable and the need for adaptation increases as the institutional distance between source and recipient locations increases however arguments to date have examined the effect of adaptation primarily on a subsidiary s long term performance a necessary precursor is to understand the effect of adaptation on the transfer process itself as transfer difficulty or stickiness may preclude the reuse of an organizational practice in the first place in this paper we explore how the adaptation of organizational practices affects the stickiness of cross border transfers we use structural equation modeling to analyze data from 122 internal transfers of best practice contrary to expectation we find that adaptation significantly increases rather than decreases the stickiness of cross border knowledge transfer

cultural industries in international business research progress and prospect cultural industries systems of organizations that produce and distribute cultural goods with substantive symbolic aesthetic or artistic value represent an important exciting and complex context that receives growing scholarly attention as the first review of management research on cultural industries this paper aims to provide a systematic synthesis of current research summarizing distinctive characteristics of cultural industries and highlighting research gaps we also illustrate how the unique nature dynamics and evolution of cultural industries provide opportunities to broaden international business theories in four research themes i e internationalization strategy cross border innovation social inclusion in the global economy and emerging market research

the underdetermined knowledge based theory of the mnc in this note we revisit two core propositions of the knowledge based view of the firm found in the seminal work of kogut and zander 1 that multinational corporations mncs exist because transfers and re combinations of knowledge occur more efficiently inside mncs than between mncs and third parties and 2 that the threat of opportunism is not necessary although it may be sufficient to explain the existence of the mnc their knowledge based view shifted the conceptualization of the firm from an institution arising from market failure and transaction costs economizing to a progeny of superior knowledge governance we question these conclusions arguing that firms are but one of the many types of epistemic communities possessing and nurturing procedural norms identity and the cognitive linguistic and reflexive attributes conducive to efficient exchange and re combination of knowledge among their members important insights may be gained by applying the concept of epistemic communities implicit in the knowledge based perspective beyond firm level hierarchies journal of international business studies 2011 42 427 435

the internalisation theory of the multinational enterprise a review of the progress of a research agenda after 30 years this paper reviews the progress of the research agenda initiated by the future of the multinational enterprise 1976 focusing initially on the problem of explaining the existence of the multinational enterprise the agenda soon broadened to encompass the analysis of alternative modes of foreign market entry the role of international joint ventures the impact of innovation on corporate growth and the role of culture in international business the core philosophy based on the coasian nature of the firm and on rational action modelling has remained constant while the widening range of applications has encouraged synthesis with theories developed in other fields of research success in answering any one question invariably generates new questions which must in turn be answered through a further extension of the theory and this dynamic continues to drive the development of the theory today internalisation theory has retained its validity and its vitality over the past 30 years and is currently being extended into new fields of international business research

knowledge sharing and social interaction within mnes social interaction between managers from different units of a multinational enterprise mne has been shown to be an important factor stimulating intra mne knowledge sharing face to face social interactions form a communication channel particularly conducive to the transfer of tacit non codified knowledge but intensive social interaction also provides opportunities for social construction of knowledge in a learning dialogue the first explanation sender receiver makes us expect social interaction to moderate positively the effects of the factors giving rise to knowledge flows in the first place such as differences in capabilities between mne subsidiaries the second perspective social learning also grants an independent effect to social interaction as a main factor stimulating intra mne knowledge flows we formulate hypotheses based on both perspectives and test these on data from 169 mne subsidiaries our findings show a considerable main effect of social interaction on all intra mne knowledge flows confirming the expectations based on the social learning model interaction effects based on the predictions of the sender receiver model are only partly confirmed these findings suggest that future research should devote more attention to the social constitution of mne knowledge

from crossing cultures to straddling them an empirical examination of outcomes for multicultural employees international organizations ranging from large mncs to small born global firms are increasingly recognizing that multicultural employees can help them operate across countries and across cultures however multiculturals individuals who identify with and internalize more than one culture are a diverse group and organizations seeking to leverage their potential can benefit from a deeper understanding of the resources they possess and the challenges they face we conducted three studies with a total of 1196 participants to test relationships between multicultural identity patterns and personal social and task outcomes consistent results across studies indicated that individuals with more cultural identities higher identity plurality had more social capital and higher levels of intercultural skills than those with fewer cultural identities while individuals who integrated their cultural identities higher identity integration experienced higher levels of personal well being than those who separated them based on these results we advocate for two directions in future research on multicultural employees moving beyond cognitive mechanisms alone and examining monocultural and multicultural individuals simultaneously along the spectrum of identity plurality

glocal understandings female readers perceptions of the new woman in chinese advertising research in international advertising has often taken a dichotomized approach as exemplified by the global standardization vs localization debate it is assumed under the standardization approach that the globalization process will absorb different national cultures into a global commercial culture such that standardized advertising should be preferred the current research argues that the dichotomization approach may have oversimplified the way consumers read and interpret ad images we postulate that consumers in a transitional economy apply a variety of reading approaches including different cultural interpretive strategies and self referencing to absorb global images into their cultural and consumption schemas this is commonly referred to as glocalization we developed a typology of modern women images in chinese magazine advertising potential interpretive strategies and self referencing responses in this research results of a content analysis and a reader response study support our postulations implications are discussed

the future of the multinational enterprise in retrospect and in prospect we are sometimes asked how the future of the multinational enterprise came to be written and whether we think that a similar book could be written today it is always difficult to be objective about your own work but we doubt that a similar book could appear today this is not because there is a dearth of talent or because all the important issues have been resolved it is simply that the academic environment in which research in international businesses is carried out has fundamentally changed political salience the future was written at a time of great debates in international political economy multinationals stood accused of global hegemony there were strident calls for the american challenge to european industry to be repelled servan schreiber 1968 foreign investment in third world countries was leading to uneven development technology was overpriced a conspiracy of oligopolistic firms was holding consumers and workers to ransom what nonsense you might say but the united nations took it seriously enough and set up a committee of eminent persons to consider a possible code of conduct for multinationals a process that led to the formation of the un centre on transnational corporations in this heady atmosphere separating fact from fiction was crucial a lot of good statistical work was being done indeed it is probable that more was known about patterns of foreign direct investment than about any other aspect of industrial economics at the time us bureau of commerce the harvard project led by raymond vernon but how could the statistics be interpreted general equilibrium theory did not seem to be up to the task a new framework was needed that would allow the statistics to reveal the underlying dynamics of multinational behaviour with the right theory it would be possible to use the statistics to pass judgement on competing views positivism political salience prompted many scholars to write about multinationals the future was distinguished by its strongly positivist stance the book began by summarizing the stylized facts revealed by the published statistics the well known distinction between direct and indirect investment was carefully examined journal of international business studies 2003 34 219 222 2003 palgrave macmillan ltd all rights reserved 0047 2506 25 00

evaluating electricity sector reforms in argentina lessons for developing countries abstract in argentina prior to the macroeconomic crisis of early 2002 power sector reforms had proven successful in delivering low electricity tariffs and increasing private investments this had been achieved through the unbundling of electricity supply businesses and the introduction of competition paying due attention to the lessons learned by forerunners in power sector reform including neighbouring chile the reforms that had been implemented in argentina were therefore deemed to have been a success however in the wake of the macroeconomic crisis and the devaluation of the peso generators and gas suppliers found themselves in critical financial straights which caused a halt to additional investment the current challenge facing reforms in the argentine power sector is to rebound from the financial ramifications of peso devaluation and to promote private investment given these basic facts this paper traces the history of reforms in the argentine electricity sector assessing the progress that has been achieved and suggesting lessons for developing countries it is often the case in developing countries that the unbundling of vertically integrated state owned industries into privatised enterprises requires efforts to improve infrastructure as a prerequisite for the introduction of competitive practices bearing this in mind this paper lays out measures that would be useful to consider for electricity sector reforms in developing countries from the following three perspectives 1 transition from a state owned power companies to private enterprises 2 development of conditions required to promote infrastructure projects and 3 development of conditions for the establishment of a healthy and fair competitive environment assuming that liberalisation is achieved once the conditions in 1 and 2 are met

the effects of within country linguistic and religious diversity on foreign acquisitions this article explores how within country diversity of both language and religion influences the ownership structure of foreign acquisitions commentators have acknowledged the potential importance of within country diversity but to date this issue has received minimal empirical attention we propose that diversity plays two distinct roles namely diversity within the host country may be an additional source of behavioral uncertainty and information asymmetry over and above the effects arising from cross national differences moreover diversity within the home country may increase the cognitive complexity of the decision makers moderating the firm s response to the distance and diversity of the host country results based on foreign acquisitions across 67 acquirer and 69 target countries confirm both of these roles while the main focus of this article is on the role that within country diversity plays in international business decisions it also makes contributions in terms of expanding the range of dimensions of distance investigated in the cross border acquisition literature in highlighting a potentially positive role that diversity might play in such acquisitions and in providing a potential explanation for asymmetries in distance that is differences in cognitive complexity

knowledge transfer in international acquisitions this paper reports on a multimethod study of knowledge transfer in international acquisitions using questionnaire data we show that the transfer of technological know how is facilitated by communication visits meetings and by time elapsed since acquisition while the transfer of patents is associated with the articulability of the knowledge the size of the acquired unit and the recency of the acquisition using case study data we show that the immediate post acquisition period is characterized by imposed one way transfers of knowledge from the acquirer to the acquired but over time this gives way to high quality reciprocal knowledge transfer

a retrospective on culture s consequences the 35 year journey abstract our 2006 journal of international business studies article a quarter century of culture s consequences a review of the empirical research incorporating hofstede s cultural values framework provided a comprehensive review of 180 empirical journal articles and edited volume chapters published between 1980 and june 2002 that incorporated hofstede s cross cultural values framework we examined empirical research that positioned culture as either a main or moderating effect the review attempted to make sense of the almost quarter century of research examining the impact of culture at the individual group organization and country levels in the present commentary we provide a a summary of the progress that has been made in the intervening decade and most importantly b a new set of recommendations for the next decade to guide those wishing to study the role of national culture in organizations

knowledge transfer in international acquisitions a retrospective in this retrospective we summarise and discuss the findings of our 1999 jibs paper knowledge transfer in international acquisitions and we consider how research in this area has evolved over the last decade the paper s key contribution was to show how the post acquisition integration process in a sample of three international acquisitions led to the creation of a social community characterised by two way knowledge sharing between the acquirer and acquired companies we discuss how the timing of this publication as an early contribution to the knowledge based perspective on the firm helped its visibility and we consider the boundary conditions around our findings

organizing knowledge processes in the multinational corporation an introduction this introduction discusses the contrast between on the one hand the current popularity of addressing mnc organization in knowledge terms and on the other the lack of adequate understanding of many of the causal mechanisms and contextual factors in relations between knowledge processes and organizational factors a number of the relevant research challenges are identified and it is clarified how the five articles in this focused issue addresses some of these

multiculturalism from a cognitive perspective patterns and implications multiculturalism the internal representation of multiple cultural meaning systems has critical implications for global managers and multinational corporations mncs understanding multiculturalism is becoming increasingly important given that the locations within which mnc activity resides and the composition of the workforce even within a given location are more diverse building on the connectionism perspective we offer a novel cognitive conceptualization of multiculturalism that incorporates the individual s multicultural cognitive content and structure based on that we explain how specific sociocultural experiences interact with existing individual cognitions to form different patterns of multiculturalism specifically we propose five stylized patterns compartmentalization integration inclusion convergence and generalization and explain how they are developed through specific sociocultural experiences we discuss how different patterns of multiculturalism influence specific capabilities of multicultural mnc managers and their effectiveness in a variety of critical mnc tasks we believe the cognitive connectionist perspective which has not been brought before into international business discussions of culture and cultural capabilities holds great promise for better understanding global managers capabilities and development

language policies and practices in wholly owned foreign subsidiaries a recontextualization perspective this study adopts a recontextualization perspective on language policies and practices in wholly owned foreign subsidiaries drawing on a field study of 101 subsidiaries in japan we develop a contingency model that distinguishes between four different types of recontextualization with characteristic language policies and practices developing locally adaptive developing globally integrated established locally adaptive and established globally integrated our analysis shows how each of these four types is accompanied by specific problems and challenges in particular it elucidates five important aspects of language implementation 1 the emergence of language praxis from the interplay of headquarters strategies and local responses 2 the hybridization of language practices 3 the central role of key actors such as subsidiary presidents in recontextualization 4 the pervasive power implications of language policies and practices and 5 the multifaceted implications for strategic human resource management by so doing our analysis opens up new avenues for context specific and practice oriented studies of language in multinational companies

think glocally act glocally a culture centric comment on leung bhagat buchan erez and gibson 2005 culture is a critical variable in international business ib and leung bhagat buchan erez and gibson 2005 enrich our understanding of its role however that said their framing of this variable conflates the role of national culture nc a particular form of culture with culture itself a more pivotal holistic and central construct this paper by commenting on and critiquing their approach seeks to shift the theoretical center of gravity from a nc centric paradigm to a culture centric constructivist one and from a top down bottom up view to a flatter glocalized one implications are provided which suggest that research should address cultural processes of patterning and production as well as cultural forms such as global communities and global culture gc which share with or even capture the spotlight from nc as a focus for studying and developing ib cultural theory journal of international business studies 2009 40 237 254 doi 10 1057 palgrave jibs 8400410