IT INVESTMENT AND INTANGIBLES: EVIDENCE FROM BANKS

This paper models the investment behavior of a multi‐asset firm with market power that accumulates valuable intangible assets to complement the IT capital. The investment model is estimated using data from Spanish banks on assets of different nature: material (branches, financial), immaterial (advertising and IT), and intangible (training of workers). The paper estimates that the representative bank spends five additional Euros per Euro invested in IT‐related assets in complementary intangible assets or, equivalently, intangibles amount to approximately 10 percent of the economic value of the representative bank. The remaining economic value is distributed between 28 percent from rents attributed to market power, and 62 percent to the cost of market‐purchased assets.     

Growth of Investor Owned and Cooperative Firms in Greek Dairy Industry

This paper examines the factors that affect the annual growth of cooperatives and investor owned firms (IOF) in Greek diary industry over the period 1990–94. A comparison based on both cooperative principals and property rights theory is made between IOFs and cooperatives to study their characteristics. However an empirical work is required to explain differences, if any, in the growth of the two types of firms within the same market. The work examines the determinants of the annual growth and it tests whether significant differences between IOFs and cooperatives exist. Ordinary least squares results show that both diversification and advertising strategies are important determinants for IOF growth, while the cooperative growth depends on capital structure and intensity and these organizations do not effectively apply competitive strategies.     

WHAT CREATES ABNORMAL PROFITS?

In this paper, we re‐examine the debate regarding the determinants of persistent abnormal profits. Abnormal profits are estimated using data on tangible and intangible capital for 2689 Australian firms over a 17‐year period. The determinants of abnormal profits are then estimated using variables collated from accounting and survey data on innovation and management practices. We find that market share, use of lead‐time strategies, and industry concentration all affect abnormal profits.     

An empirical examination of small firm growth

We find that the extent of small firm growth is negatively related to industry capital intensity and advertising intensity, but it is positively related to the extent of human capital, total innovation activity, and small firm innovation activity, and the extent to which the productivity growth of small firms has exceeded that of large firms.     

刺激还是抑制：企业负债对广告投入影响的理论与实证研究

以布莱德和莱维斯的理论为基础,假设广告具有拓展效应和窃取效应,研究企业负债与市场地位对企业广告投资的影响。结果显示：企业资本市场行为影响其产品市场竞争,负债具有竞争策略性;企业负债刺激其广告投入,而竞争对手负债抑制其广告投入;寡头垄断市场,企业初始市场份额抑制其广告投入;广告投入具有行业差异,且非制造业内部差异更大。研究结论拓展布莱德和莱维斯研究的同时,也给企业广告投资提供参考价值。     

ESTIMATES OF INTANGIBLE INVESTMENT BY INDUSTRY AND PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH IN JAPAN

In estimating intangible investment in Japan at the industry level, we find a high intangible investment/gross value added ratio in the information technology (IT) sector and negative growth rates in intangible capital in 13 industries over the decade from 2000. When we examine the impacts of intangible investment on total factor productivity growth, we find a significant and positive effect on total factor productivity growth in the market economy. In a revised estimation that considers intertemporal knowledge spillovers, the estimated rate of return on intangibles in the IT sector is quite high after the IT revolution. The results imply that intangible assets have been underinvested in the IT sector.     

The persistence of profits in the Greek manufacturing industry, 1963–88

The objective of this article is to evaluate empirically the profit rate persistence in the case of the Greek manufacturing industry (1963–88). More specifically, we address ourselves to two questions: first, do industrial profit rates eventually converge on a common rate? and secondly, what are the factors that affect the speed of adjustment of industrial profit rates? Our results suggest: a high persistence of profit rates for most industrial sectors; a generally high permanent component of the profit rates with substantial variations among sectors; and a similarity with other studies of industrialized countries with regards to the factors (concentration ratio, advertising intensity, export intensity, capital intensity etc.) affecting the speed of adjustment.     

ADVERTISING RESTRICTIONS, COMPETITION, AND ALCOHOL CONSUMPTION

Distilled spirits producers recently voted to eliminate their voluntary ban on broadcast advertising. The ban received public support because of the high social cost associated with alcohol consumption and the belief that advertising promotes alcohol consumption and abuse. In spite of this belief, the empirical evidence indicates that advertising has no significant effect on the market demand for distilled spirits. This evidence has led many policy economists to conclude that eliminating the ban will have no effect on alcohol consumption. The purpose of this research is to show that this conclusion is incorrect because it ignores the fact that advertising restrictions may affect industry competition as well as market demand.     

Intangible Investment and Market Valuation

This study derives performance‐ and expenditure‐based estimates of intangible capital and measures the extent to which intangible capital is captured by the equity market measures of firm value. Intangible capital is evaluated using occupational information available in the Finnish linked employer–employee data for the 1997–2011 period. The performance‐based organizational investment in value added is approximately 3 percent; R&D and ICT investment shares are lower, at 1.5 percent, and all are clustered in intangible‐intensive sectors that represent 40 percent of the private sector. Expenditure‐based organizational capital also exists in clusters other than that intensively investing in managerial and marketing effort, and performance‐based R&D capital is concentrated in the cluster with intensive R&D activity; both increase the market value of firms beyond the level that can be explained by standard economic analysis.     

Brand capital and firm value

We study the role of brand capital – a primary form of intangible capital – for firm valuation and risk in the cross section of publicly traded firms. Using an empirical measure of brand capital stock constructed from advertising expenditures accounting data, we show that: (i) firms with low brand capital investment rates have higher average stock returns than firms with high brand capital investment rates, a difference of 5.2% per annum; (ii) more brand capital intensive firms have higher average stock returns than less brand capital intensive firms, a difference of 5.1% per annum; and (iii) investment in both brand capital and physical capital is volatile and procyclical. A neoclassical investment-based model in which brand capital is a factor of production subject to adjustment costs matches the data well. The model also provides a novel explanation for the empirical links between advertising expenditures and stock returns around seasoned equity offerings (SEO) documented in previous studies.     

The adoption of new technology by listed companies: the case of Twitter

This study investigates the adoption of Twitter by Australian listed companies for disseminating marketing information (including corporate promotion) and for directly interacting with consumers. Based on a sample of the Top 200 Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) listed companies, we find that companies with larger market capital are more likely to adopt Twitter for static advertising, a one-way communication approach, and direct interaction with consumers, a two-way communication approach. Companies with smaller market capital that adopt Twitter for marketing communication appear to disseminate more corporate promotion information, a static advertising approach. Overall, our results indicate that the level of a company's access to resources can influence their adoption of a new technology and the manner in which it is used. This study calls for further clarification of regulation regarding marketing communication on social media and experience sharing between industry practitioners.     

中西式快餐业品牌战略比较及启示

品牌是企业无形的财富,尤其对快餐业来说,品牌是快餐业生存的法宝.随着全球化的深入,外国品牌大举进入中国市场并占据了相当大的一部分市场份额,中国快餐业必须有自己的品牌才能与西式快餐抗衡.本文重点从中西式快餐品牌名称符号选择、重视程度、产品开发、人员招募、培训、晋升标准、店面寻址、店面设计标准和环境布局几个方面对中式快餐与西式快餐的品牌战略的差异进行了分析,同时,又从品牌的创新性、著名品牌数量、规模效益、品牌文化性、国际化程度等方面对我国快餐业存在的问题进行了深入分析,在此基础上本文提出了我国快餐业应从产品品牌特色打造,实施差异化战略,产品的不断创新,保持规模与效益的平衡,优良品质打造等几个方面打造我国快餐业品牌.     

CAN INVESTMENT IN INTANGIBLES EXPLAIN THE SWEDISH PRODUCTIVITY BOOM IN THE 1990s?

In the early 1990s the Swedish economy experienced a severe economic and financial crisis which resulted in a substantial GDP decrease. Even though the crisis was not a complete surprise for many economists, almost no one expected that the Swedish economy would be prospering with booming productivity growth only a few years later. Economists have presented three explanations for the fast recovery and productivity growth in 1995–2006: market reforms, crisis recovery, and the impact of ICT. This paper offers an alternative view, emphasizing instead firms' substantial investment in intangible assets such as R&D, design, and advertising. Based on the growth accounting framework, intangible capital accounted for more than 30 percent of the labor productivity growth in the Swedish business sector from 1995 to 2006. Thus, Swedish TFP growth, one of the highest among OECD countries, is reduced substantially when investment in intangibles is included in the growth accounting analysis.     

Entry and industry evolution: the UK car industry, 1958—83

This paper models entry and the subsequent changes in market structure in three segments of the UK car industry, 1958–83. The entry equation emerges from a dynamic optimization model which allows for the costs of acquiring market share. The model is used to explore the hypothesis that the market penetration of entrants in this industry was facilitated by a post-entry advertising war which the incumbent firms lost. The basic hypothesis under examination is that advertising both facilitates and restricts entry, but that it does so in a way that varies systematically over time. The data are consistent with this view, showing that high advertising shares readily translate into high market shares, but that the escalation of industry advertising caused by entry can make high advertising entry strategies increasingly costly over time.     

Industrial concentration and competition in Malaysian manufacturing

Industrial concentration is the most widely studied area among various elements of market structure in the industrial organization literature. This paper is a first attempt to analyse the determinants of changes in industry concentration over time in the case of Malaysia. Using a partial adjustment model, a cross-sectional analysis is carried out against a sample of manufacturing industries between 1986 and 1996. Domestic factors in influencing competition e.g. capital intensity, advertising intensity and market size are found to be significant in most cases to explain the level of concentration. Considering variable rate of adjustment of concentration, an increase in labour productivity of large firms and high entry rates are found to be significant for faster adjustment towards equilibrium level. Compared with other developed countries, the annual rate of structural adjustment is found to be slow in the case of Malaysian manufacturing.     

Impact of Intangible Capital on Productivity and Growth: Lessons from the Indian Information Technology Software Industry*

This paper examines the impact of intangible capital, including human capital and organisational capabilities on productivity, using India as an illustrative example. The research breaks new ground in creating measures of intangible capital at a micro level. Measures of tangible and intangible capital are used to estimate a ‘new economy’ production function with panel data. Generalised method of moments techniques are used to account for unobserved firm heterogeneity and endogenous explanatory variables. The results indicate that intangible assets have a major impact on software sector output. This has important implications for public policy and corporate strategy towards the information technology industry, including for Australia.     

控股股东股权质押、控制权转移风险与广告投入

股权质押使控股股东面临控制权转移风险,其有动机进行市值管理。本文以2011-2019年中国A股上市公司为样本,考察股权质押情境下控股股东是否存在调整广告投入的行为。研究结果发现,控股股东进行股权质押后,公司广告投入水平显著提高,说明股权质押情境下控股股东会通过策略性地增加广告投入进行信息管理,而非通过削减广告投入进行向上盈余管理,证实广告具有短期股票回报效应;控制权转移风险较大时,控股股东股权质押对广告投入的正向影响更明显,说明股权质押情境下控股股东增加广告投入是出于缓解控制权转移风险的动机。进一步研究发现,在散户规模较大和产品直接与消费者接触的企业,广告更容易吸引投资者注意力,此时控股股东增加广告投入的动机更强,该行为短期内可以提振股价,但没有起到改善经营业绩的作用且加剧了股价波动。本文为资本市场和产品市场的联系提供了证据,且对相关部门加强上市公司广告费用监管具有一定的政策参考价值。     

The relative economic performance of foreign subsidiaries in UK manufacturing

This paper compares the economic performance of UK and foreign-owned firms in UK manufacturing industry. A panel data set covering 14 233 firms for the period 1992–1996 is used and the influences of firm-, industry- and country-specific advantages on productivity are examined. The results of the study show that labour productivity is higher in foreign subsidiaries than in UK firms and that foreign subsidiaries as a whole employ higher levels of human capital and enjoy greater economies of scale. A further source of productivity advantage for US subsidiaries is their higher level of intangible assets, and for European and Japanese subsidiaries their higher level of capital intensity. The results have policy implications for the targeting of promotion activities to attract FDI.     

非物质文化遗产的价值审视:基于生存资源与文化资本的两个维度

非物质文化遗产保护是一个新而急的社会课题,理清非物质文化遗产的社会价值与经济价值,对于指导我们保护与开发非物质文化遗产、发展民族特色文化产业,具有重要的现实意义。文章在非物质文化遗产生存现状分析的基础之上,从生存资源与文化资本的两个维度审视非物质文化遗产的价值,探寻特色化、差异化的民族文化产业发展之路。     

What determines productivity performance of telecommunications services industry? A cross-country analysis

This article investigates the key factors that determine the productivity performance of telecommunications services industry. A simple theoretical model is used to illustrate that the Total Factor Productivity (TFP) growth is attributable to the effects of scale economies, market competition and technical change. We then examine empirically the effect of various factors on the TFP growth in the industry using panel data in 12 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries for the period 1983 through 2003. The empirical results are consistent with the theoretical prediction. A new finding in this article is that higher machinery and equipment (M&E) capital intensity and human capital contribute to higher TFP growth in the telecommunications services industry. The decomposition analysis also suggests that technical change induced by changes in M&E capital intensity and human capital are important sources of productivity performance in the industry across the OECD countries, contributing to about 20–50% and 2–7% of TFP growth, respectively. These findings highlight the importance of improving the conditions for M&E capital investment and the quality of human capital, which in turn could facilitate the adoption of new technologies and enhance the productivity in the industry.