Industrial Companies' Evaluation Criteria in New Product Development Gates

This article presents the results of a study on the evaluation criteria that companies use at several gates in the NPD process. The findings from 166 managers suggest that companies use different criteria at different NPD evaluation gates. While such criteria as technical feasibility, intuition and market potential are stressed in the early‐screening gates of the NPD process, a focus on product performance, quality, and staying within the development budget are considered of paramount importance after the product has been developed. During and after commercialization, customer acceptance and satisfaction and unit sales are primary considerations. In addition, based on the performance dimensions developed by Griffin and Page (1993), we derive patterns of use of various evaluative dimensions at the NPD gates. Our results show that while the market acceptance dimension permeates evaluation at all the gates in the NPD process, the financial dimension is especially important during the business analysis gate and after‐market launch. The product performance dimension figures strongly in the product and market testing gates. The importance of our additional set of criteria (i.e., product uniqueness, market potential, market chance, technical feasibility, and intuition) decreases as the NPD process unfolds. Overall the above pattern of dimensions' usage holds true for both countries in which we collected our data, and across firms of different sizes, holding different market share positions, with different NPD drivers, following different innovation strategies, and developing different types of new products. The results also are stable for respondents that differ in terms of expertise and functional background. The results of this study provide useful guidelines for project selection and evaluation purposes and therefore can be helpful for effective investment decision‐making at gate‐meetings and for project portfolio management. We elaborate on these guidelines for product developers and marketers wishing to employ evaluation criteria in their NPD gates, and we discuss directions for further research.     

Strategies for best practice in research and technology institutes: an overview of a benchmarking exercise

Many technology institutes have been criticised for their dislocation from, or lack of relevance to, industry. This paper provides an overview of a major benchmaking study which analyzed in depth the most successful technology institutes from eight nations (four in Europe and four in East Asia). Institutes selected for study met a criterion which included a combination of dynamism, relevance to industry, contribution to the national science and technology infrastructure, independent fund-raising capability, innovative organizational structures, and effective management. The paper examines the activities engaged in by the eight institutes, the principal challenges they face, and identifies the main success factors underlying their achievements. The paper attempts to illustrate practical, best practice strategies by showing how leading technology institutes have successfully contributed to their national system of innovation. To this end, success factors have been categorized into those factors which are under the direct control of the institutes (internal), which are outside of their influence (external), and those which can be affected to a lesser or greater extent.     

Economic Integration: Systemic Measures in an Input–Output Framework

Countries are linked through trade and for their mutual benefits they often group together. Consequently, trade blocs are formed in some form or another, examples of which are the EU, EFTA, ASEAN, NAFTA, and SAARC. Depending upon the form and the nature of the grouping, trade relations among countries obviously vary across the trade blocs. The pattern and the volume of trade of the participating countries are different and thus cause different impacts on the growth and development of the countries concerned. Also, the nature of integration changes over time. To examine the strength of integration within trade blocs, systemic measures of integration hitherto not available are formulated in an input–output framework. The measures are used, as a case study, to assess the inter-temporal variations in the degree of integration of SAARC.     

Risk compensation in wages – a replication

We use data from Germany, The Netherlands, Portugal and Spain to test for the effect of earnings variation on individual earnings. We replicate estimates for the USA and find that the variance of earnings in an occupation affects individual wages positively while the skewness of earnings has a negative effect. Both results are in conformity with wage compensation for risk averse workers. First version received: March 2001/Final version received: July 2002 We are grateful to two anonymous referees for valuable comments.     

A bivariate Poisson count data model using conditional probabilities

The applied econometrics of bivariate count data predominantly focus on a bivariate Poisson density with a correlation structure that is very restrictive. The main limitation is that this bivariate distribution excludes zero and negative correlation. This paper introduces a new model which allows for a more flexible correlation structure. To this end the joint density is decomposed by means of the multiplication rule in marginal and conditional densities. Simulation experiments and an application of the model to recreational data are presented.     

Eine Bibliographie der allgemeinen Lehrgeschichten der Nationalökonomie: 1933–1958

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

?konomische Grundfragen der Klimaanpassung

The option of climate adaptation is becoming more and more important in climate change policy. A large number of countries has already initiated a process of adaptation by drafting strategies or catalogues of measures. Hence there is an urgent need to support this process at the scientific level. The discipline of economics has a key role to play in this context. Against this background, this paper scrutinises the fundamental economic questions challenging the adaptation policy which is broadly supported. It outlines how economics may contribute to a successful adaptation process concerning the objectives of adaptation policies, appropriate instruments, the role of both spontaneous and planned adaptation as well as possible assessment tools for evaluation of adaptation policies.     

The power and peril of board interlocks

In order to compete, firms must constantly gather and assess information that will help them identify and evaluate emerging opportunities. Their social context is instrumental in determining what information they have to work with and how they might make sense of and act upon that information. Unfortunately, many firms allow themselves to become under-connected, which isolates them from new sources of information, or over-reliant on just a few connections, creating a bottleneck for the flow of information. Herein, we describe how these problems manifest themselves among the network of interlocked directors, which is created when directors of firms sit on multiple boards. This network is so vast and complex that fully understanding the position and structure of a given firm's board interlocks remains elusive. Toward solving this problem, we offer five keys to developing a board with effective interlocks, as well as three cautions regarding how board interlocks could potentially hurt firms.