The creation view of opportunities at the base of the pyramid

This research aims to understand how multinational corporations (MNCs) enter the base of the pyramid (BoP) by adopting the creation view of opportunities. We employ actor–network theory and explore the key actors, the process and the opportunity development that enable MNCs to tackle the relative poverty of the BoP market. Our qualitative exploratory case study illustrates that, at the BoP, MNCs have to involve beneficiary stakeholders such as non-governmental organizations and BoP communities. In this process, they should be open to modifying their business model continuously to build awareness about the product among the poor and ensure affordability, availability and acceptability. At the BoP, opportunities do not exist in the external environment and they should be developed by identifying and addressing the real needs of the poor, enhancing their quality of life and being patient about earning a profit. This research contributes to the entrepreneurship literature by expanding the creation perspective of opportunities and provides implications for the managers of companies targeting the BoP market.     

On Offshoring and Trade Deficit

The paper constructs a general equilibrium model of North–South trade with nontraded goods, real exchange rate, and a continuum of components that North partly offshores to South. It is shown that a protectionary policy which restricts offshoring may have the unintended consequence of widening the trade deficit.     

Consumption response to investment shocks under financial frictions

Consumption falls counter-factually on impact for investment-specific technology shocks, which, recent literature suggests, are important drivers of business cycles. Introducing financial frictions and variable capacity utilization to the standard New-Keynesian setup can overturn this co-movement problem, without imposing restrictions on wealth effects, or wage rigidities.     

Which Dimension of Corporate Social Responsibility is a Value Driver in the Oil and Gas Industry?

The oil and gas (O&G) industry suffers from a negative perception of poor sustainability. O&G companies are therefore engaged in several socially sustainable activities related to community development and environmental protection. This article determines whether the social, environmental, and economic dimensions of corporate social responsibility (CSR) are equally value‐additive to O&G companies. We measure the company‐specific level of CSR activities from the information provided in the annual financial reports of O&G companies and determine the effects of CSR dimensions on firm value. We find that CSR enhances firm value of O&G companies. While social activities such as employee well‐being and community development are key value‐drivers, environmental and economic sustainable activities have an insignificant impact on the market value of O&G companies. Copyright © 2018 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd     

Interpoint Distance Classification of High Dimensional Discrete Observations

Classification is a multivariate technique that is concerned with allocating new observations to two or more groups. We use interpoint distances to measure the closeness of the samples and construct new rules for high dimensional classification of discrete observations. Applicable to high dimensional data, the new method is non‐parametric and uses test‐based classification with permutation testing. We propose a modification of a test‐based rule to use relative values with respect to the training samples baseline. We compare the proposed rule with parametric methods, such as likelihood ratio rule and modified linear discriminate function, and non‐parametric techniques such as support vector machine, nearest neighbour and depth‐based classification, under multivariate Bernoulli, multinomial and multivariate Poisson distributions.     

Financing constraints and investment efficiency: evidence from a panel of Canadian forest firms

This article examines the financial constraint of 18 listed Canadian forest firms between 2000 and 2014 following the stochastic frontier approach. Empirical results support the observation that Canadian forest firms have a strong dependence of using both equity financing and debt financing as the coefficients of both equity and debt financing mean functions are significant at 1% level. The distribution of investment efficiency index (IEI) of all 18 firms demonstrates a loss of around 40% of the rate of investment due to financing constraints. Regional analysis demonstrates that the time-varying patters of IEI of three provinces are significantly different.     

Economic impact of introducing TYRX amongst patients with heart failure and reduced ejection fraction undergoing implanted cardiac device procedures: a retrospective model based cost analysis

Background and aims: Infection is a serious and expensive complication of Cardiac Implantable Electronic Device (CIED) procedures. A retrospective based cost analysis was performed to estimate Trust level savings of using the TYRX antibacterial envelope as a primary prevention measure against infection in a tertiary referral centre in South London, UK.

Methods: A retrospective cohort of heart failure patients with reduced ejection fraction undergoing Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator (ICD) or Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy (CRT) procedures were evaluated. Decision-analytic modelling was performed to determine economic savings of using the envelope during CIED procedure vs CIED procedure alone.

Results: Over a 12?month follow-up period following CIED procedure, the observed infection rate was 3.14% (n?=?5/159). The average cost of a CIED infection inpatient admission was £41,820 and, further to economic analysis, the additional costs attributable to infection was calculated at £62,213.94. A cost saving of £624 per patient by using TYRX during CIED procedure as a primary preventative measure against infection was estimated.

Conclusions: TYRX would be a cost-saving treatment option amongst heart failure patients undergoing ICD and CRT device procedures based on analysis in the local geographical area of South London. If upscaled to the UK population, we estimate potential cost savings for the National Health Service (NHS).     

An index for cross-country analysis of ICT infrastructure and access

The purpose of the present article is to devise an index for measuring and analyzing the divide among countries in the area of information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure and access. Understanding the fact that there are many factors influencing the digital divide, this research is not intended to measure the digital divide in terms of different inequalities, but it rather attempts to take only one of the most important of these factors (maybe the most important of them) into consideration for measuring and analyzing divide between countries, that is, ICT infrastructure and access. In contrast to the majority of the indices in this context, the proposed index is built upon defining and conceptualizing ICT infrastructure and access. In addition, the index uses core ICT indicators on which the international community and experienced modelers have consensus that they measure the information society suitably. Therefore, the index can be exploited as the basis and standard for internationally comparable statistics in ICT infrastructure and access area. Moreover, it is the second index based on core ICT indicators after the Digital Opportunity Index (DOI) that was developed by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in 2005. However, in the current article, using Data Mining methods, Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) (to impute missing data) and Multi-Stage Factor Analysis (FA) (for aggregating the indicators), many problems and limits of the existing indices, the DOI in particular, such as the lack of data for analyzing ICT infrastructure and access, use of equal weighting or experts’ opinions to aggregate the indicators, are avoided. Since this index is developed by statistical procedures, it is flexible, adaptable, and modifiable over time while it sustains its original structure. It is comprised of two main dimensions: ‘ICT access’ and ‘coverage of mobile and access tariffs’ and 10 indicators. Finally, comparing the proposed index with the other indices in this field and gross national income (GNI) per capita of 150 countries, this index is tested; then, it is utilized to measure and analyze the divide between countries in the two dimensions, different geographical areas, economic conditions, and levels of ICT infrastructure and access.     

On non-linear tariff schedules

A non-linear tariff is one in which the total tariff paid by an individual is not proportional to the amount he imports. In this paper, we analyze optimal non-linear tariffs set by a welfare-maximizing government subject to a revenue constraint. The optimal schedule consists of a two-part tariff over an initial range of imports, and a continuous schedule for further imports that satisfies a modified Ramsey rule.