Hong Kong's industrial success: an entrepreneurial perspective

This article examines the role of entrepreneurship in the industrialization of Hong Kong. Kirzner's concept of entrepreneurship is applied to explain the industrial dynamics of the economy. Using the electronics industry as illustration, this article argues that Hong Kong's manufacturing industry has been driven principally by adaptive entrepreneurship, which takes the form of small-scale enterprise, product imitation, subcontracting and spatial arbitrage. Furthermore, those firms adopting imitative strategies were able to survive, though many of them relied on very small profit margins. Radical innovative strategies were seldom adopted and were not feasible in the environment of Hong Kong. Adopting adaptive entrepreneurial strategies, Hong Kong's manufacturers learned from foreign firms and imitated their products. Later, by exporting improved commodities at lower prices, they competed against the original suppliers from economically more advanced countries. This constitutes Hong Kong's industrial success.     

Enthusiasm Constrained? British Industrial R&D and the Transition from War to Peace, 1942–51

During the second half of World War II and in the years which immediately followed, British firms demonstrated a considerable enthusiasm for expanding their R&D activities. Severe restrictions on the availability of resources limited the extent to which this could be translated into practice, but many firms nonetheless managed to achieve rapid growth in the scale of their R&D facilities. Drawing on a range of archival sources generated by both government and industry, this article examines the nature of this enthusiasm and how it was shaped by the need to conform to controls on building, defence requirements, including the National Service ‘call up’, and the investment priorities determined in response to the export drive. These constriants not only underprinned the development of industrial R&D during the transition from war to peace, they also helped to ensure that British managers retained their belief that ever more R&D would ensure industrial success.     

The managing of competition: Government and industry relationships in the jute industry 1957–63

This paper examines the development of the 1963 court case brought by the Board of Trade's Restrictive Trading Agreements Office against jute manufacturers, in order to examine the impact of the newly introduced competition policy for government–business relationships. Government's active enforcement of competition marked an important change in the direction of industrial policy in the UK and the jute industry was one of the cases to be examined.     

The Transfer of Company Control from Scotland to London in the Nineteenth Century

In 1931 the British government introduced pioneering legislation to combat occupational disease in the asbestos industry. A key feature was an Asbestosis Scheme for compensating workers for industrial injury and death. This article examines the implementation of the Scheme at Turner &; Newall, the leading UK asbestos producer. The evidence reveals an inequitable system of compensation, especially when compared to the company's generosity to its shareholders. Deficiencies in British compensation law, the weaknesses of regulatory forces, and the company's policy of minimising the extent of asbestos disease are held responsible.     

Differentiation value through services in a manufacturer's delivery chain

The delivery of industrial goods includes various possibilities for service business. Previous research has concentrated on third-party logistics (3PL) providers' perspective on service opportunities. This study takes the manufacturer's perspective in inter-organizational relationships and investigates the potential for differentiation value though services associated with the delivery of industrial goods. Field observation was carried out on three high-volume construction component deliveries, to uncover differentiation value drivers and the emergence of service opportunities in a manufacturer's delivery chain. The results complement earlier 3PL-centered goods delivery research by showing that the manufacturer's unique product and process competences, and activities in the delivery chain drive differentiation value, enable new service opportunities. The findings, thereby, draw attention to manufacturers and their competences as sources of added-value service in the delivery of industrial goods. Manufacturing firms have various options for differentiation and centrality in the inter-organizational network through cooperation with third parties. The results reveal that third parties can be hidden sources of added customer value in the goods delivery chain. The differentiation value for different firms in the industrial goods' delivery chains can emerge when firms begin to develop and offer services to each other, and therefore a proactive and in-depth analysis of their customers' differentiation-oriented value hierarchies is required.     

Competition, Collusion, and Confusion: The State and the Reorganization of the British Cotton Industry, 1931-1939

British industrial policy in the 1930s has generated considerablehistorical controversy. This article furthers the debate byusing the cotton industry as a case study. The biggest constrainton active government policies toward cotton was not institutionalinertia or "industrial diplomacy," as some historians claim,but the sheer practical difficulty of intervening in such acomplex industry. Cotton also poses problems for historianswho see British industrial policy in the 1930s as largely aboutrestraining competition. The government feared that restrictionwould make matters worse in the cotton industry and was thereforehesitant about backing schemes designed to limit competition.Its dilemma was how best to maintain private-sector confidence.     

New business entrepreneurship in the Japanese economy

This article presents the results of a study focused on the role of new business entrepreneurship in the Japanese economy. Particular attention is paid to the activities of various government agencies in relation to new business entrepreneurship and to the barriers to this activity in Japan. New business entrepreneurship was defined as the formation and rapid growth of a business enterprise through unique approaches to the firm's activities.In contrast to the American stereotype of Japan as an economy of a few large, interconnected firms, it is, in fact, characterized by small- and medium-sized enterprises. Over 99% of all Japanese enterprises are categorized as small or medium and over 80% of all employed Japanese are employed by such firms. However, very few of these firms are entrepreneurial in nature. The vast majority are small firms that are either subcontractors to a single larger firm or small retail, wholesale, or restaurant establishments.The start-up rate for all types of businesses in Japan has been declining for the past 10 to 15 years. More importantly, the rate of start-up s for independent firms, as opposed to firms started by a larger firm to serve primarily as a subcontractor, declined even more sharply. This indicates a significant weakness in Japan's otherwise strong economy.The low and declining rate of new business entrepreneurship in Japan is a function of structural, governmental, and cultural barriers. Structural barriers include an acute, long-term labor shortage, high financial start-up costs due in large part to high land prices, and a shortage of venture capital funding. Government barriers include “red tape,” financial and other support for small firms that is withdrawn as they enter rapid growth, and the persistent protection of inefficient industry structures. Cultural barriers involve Japan's strong group/collective orientation, the traditional career path in Japan, bounds on creativity, and the fact that entrepreneurship is not assigned a high social value.While the government provides an extensive, well-developed network of services for small- and medium-sized firms, these programs are not designed to facilitate rapid growth into the large firm phase. The Japanese experiences and programs offer useful insights for policy and tactics by other governments.     

Corruption and industrial dualism in less developed countries

This paper provides an explanation for the observation that developing countries tend to have a higher degree of dualism in the size distribution of firms and a relatively smaller proportion of large firms than do developed countries. This paper builds a model where large 'formal' firms attract rent seeking activities from the government while small firms do not. In the model, there exists a 'competitive fringe' of small firms and a formal market consisting of Cournot competitors. The number of formal firms is made endogenous and is a function of the degree to which the government can extract rents. This ability to extract rents is itself posited as a function of the degree of corruption in a country's government. Thus, it is the high degree of corruption in developing country governments that contributes to the dual nature of their industrial structure. The model predicts that the higher the degree of corruption, the fewer (and larger) are the formal firms, the lower is social welfare and the greater is dead-weight loss, and the higher are government rents. An examination of the size distribution of 16 countries and their degree of corruption shows that the degree of corruption is a good predictor of the percentage of large firms in an economy.     

Korean Manufacturing in Transition: Patterns in the Past,Current Status,and Future Challenges

In recent years, Korea has emerged as one of the world's fastest growing industrial nations. Manufacturing industry has been the foundation of its economic success, and, in this paper, an in-depth analysis of the development process of the Korean manufacturing industry is presented. From an early stage, Korean manufacturers followed a general pattern in achieving their current success: they successfully combined high-quality, but inexpensive and plentiful, human resources with imported technologies and material to produce low-cost goods for a protected market. In this process, the Korean government played the role of planner, protector, and provider for the national economy and the entire manufacturing industry. In recent years, however, the private sector has assumed leadership in terms of planning and executing industrial development plans. With this change, Korean manufacturers are making a clear transition from a low-cost producer to a high value-added competitor with an increasing emphasis on quality and flexibility. This paper offers an empirical analysis of the performance improvements, future competitive priorities, and action programmes designed to achieve this strategic shift.     

Science and Technology in British Business History

This essay provides a comparative perspective on the process of financial reconstruction and industrial reorganisation in the large-firm sector in inter-war Sweden and the UK. The behaviour of private banks is analysed during a period when their bargaining power is likely to have been transferred from the distressed firm to any of the external investors. In the UK and Sweden investors have traditionally been viewed as having respectively an arm's length approach towards industry and a control-oriented one. The hypothesis here is that the two financial systems were more similar than has conventionally been assumed. Besides protecting their claims, creditors in both countries became involved in the rationalisation of production which followed. This empirical study is limited to 24 large firms. However, the evidence suggests that whilst the Swedish system contained elements of the arm's length approach, the British investor's involvement in industrial transformation featured elements of control-orientation.     

Process management practices: organizational (dis-)similarities

Organizational processes have been manifested as resources which are difficult to imitate. Not least because goods and services are offered worldwide on comparable levels, processes are nowadays sources of competitive advantage. Manufacturers recognized process management's benefits early on. Meanwhile service providers adopt related practices with slight adaptations as well and even potentials for small and flexible firms have been revealed. From a present-day perspective, the question arises whether manufacturers and large firms are still more process oriented than their entrepreneurial counterparts. The results of a survey-based comparison show that this situation continues to hold with fewer differences between manufacturers and service providers. However, it became clear that the process culture – one of six investigated factors – is independent from a firm's industry affiliation and size. The evidence demonstrates that service providers progress on their journey to process management, which is taking an increasingly decisive role in the management of service operations.     

Government intervention in the British gas industry, 1948 to 1970

This article analyses government–industry relations in the nationalised British gas industry in the 1950s and 1960s. New archival research suggests that the government exercised a relatively benign influence on the gas industry in this period. The gas industry was provided with adequate funds for investment, its pricing strategies were not seriously affected by macroeconomic policy interventions, and it was allowed an unconstrained choice in its use of raw materials, even though its switch to oil feedstocks exacerbated the decline of the indigenous British coal industry. This relatively favourable assessment of the impact of government policy on the gas industry contrasts rather sharply with evidence from some of the other nationalised industries which have been investigated by historians. The implication is that we need to consider government intervention in the nationalised industries on a case-by-case basis rather than reaching for simple generalisations about the sector as a whole.     

‘The trauma of competition’: The entry of Air Products Inc. into the industrial gases business in Britain and continental Europe, 1947–70

The British Oxygen Company (BOC) had a virtual monopoly on the supply of industrial gases (e.g. oxygen and acetylene) on the British market through the 1950s, when it was finally challenged by an American-based company, Air Products. Air Products Limited (APL) was able to undercut BOC's position, overcoming high barriers to entry to gain significant market share in this sector, which shares some features of network industries. Factors in this success included conditions imposed by the Board of Trade, APL's innovations, BOC's slow response, and favourable market conditions. APL's success had implications for the internationalisation of the industrial gases industry.     

The Transformation of Boral: From Dependent,Specialist Bitumen Refiner to Major Building Products Manufacturer

This essay explores the route by which Boral transformed itself from being a small firm operating in a niche within the petroleum industry to its current position as one of the largest manufacturers of building products in Australia. Boral's exit from the oil industry was largely influenced by the declining attractiveness of that market as a result of a more competitive environment. The direction of its subsequent voyage across industry and market boundaries was set by the exploitation of firm specific knowledge and competencies. Boral's bold leaps into apparently unrelated new industries represented the transfer of a core set of capabilities into new markets. Boral acquired new skills which augmented its competencies and it was able to use them to gain a competitive advantage in a wide range of related markets.     

Private Foreign Investment in India: Pain or Panacea?

Private foreign capital, whose presence in Indian industry was long regarded with concern and suspicion, is now presented as a panacea for India's poor industrial and export performance. This paper examines available evidence to compare the behaviour and performance of domestic and foreign‐controlled firms in India over the last five decades. It discusses the contribution of foreign capital to aggregate investment, balance of payments and economic growth. We assess the effects of government policy towards foreign investment, review recent changes, and outline implications for the future.     

Corporate Strategy, Corporate Culture and Conversion; Adjustment in the Defence Industry

The recent decline in military demand has prompted calls for government aid to help the arms manufacturers convert to civil production. The authors examine the shock that UK defence firms faced, the constraints their defence culture imposed and how they responded. They conclude that while the market solution, closure of defence plants and redundancy, may appear wasteful, in the longer run it is likely to be more productive than trying to convert defence plants.     

工业遗产视野下的玉门油田历史及现状调查研究

20世纪中叶以后，工业的衰退给城市的发展带来一系列挑战，人们开始重新思考工业社会在人类历史中的意义，资源面临枯竭的玉门也再次以这种方式重新回到人们的视野。玉门油田诞生于抗日战争时期，是新中国成立以前投入开发规模最大、产量最高的油田，新中国成立以后更是发挥了极大的影响力，为一批新工业企业的建立和发展作出了重要贡献，是中国近现代工业史上十分重要的一环。本文通过梳理玉门油田的发展历史及现状，尝试从“工业遗产”的角度来思考玉门油田的价值与意义。     

David R. Meyer. Networked Machinists: High-Technology Industries in Antebellum America

How did entrepreneurs in antebellum American industry acquirethe knowledge required to operate iron foundries and build steamengines, locomotives, machine tools, and even firearms? Didthey simply hire experts from England to teach the small numberof machinists in America new techniques—something difficultto do since the British government tried to prevent that knowledgefrom getting out? Or, did they rely on machinists who broughtwith them knowledge of new processes when they immigrated toAmerica? And, when     

Financial Analysis of Palestinian Industry Including Small Scale Firms

The study aims to explore the financial aspects of the Palestinian industry, and to investigate productivity and efficiency of small scale industry compared with large scale firms. In order to help policy makers in industrial planning in the new emerged Palestinian state. A special instrument has been used to collect the financial and quantitative data for the related manufacturing firms from a random sample of 215 Palestinian firms. The one way analysis of variance test was used to examine whether the mean scores differ significantly among scale sizes of the Palestinian industry concerning the selected performance measures. In addition, the Scheffe test was used as a post hoc comparison way to identify which scale size firms' performance differs than the other two scale sizes.The research revealed that small scale firms in Palestinian industry have higher labor productivity values than large scale firms, while large scale firms accomplished higher net profit margin compared to small scale industry. Creating an additional job in large scale Palestinian industry needs less cost than creating a job in small scale industry, and large scale firms have better opportunity in getting external financing than small firms.     

Restrictive Practices on the Shopfloor in Britain, 1945–60: Myth and Reality

It is widely assumed that shopfloor restrictive practices were both pervasive and very damaging in post-war British industry. Indeed, this point has been repeated by both politicians and academics, receiving perhaps its most sophisticated exposition in the work of Mancur Olson. However, a review of the contemporary evidence reveals that such an interpretation is almost wholly erroneous. Some commentators made much of restrictive practices in the 1940s and 1950s, but their accounts are hardly convincing. On the other hand, a range of more comprehensive enquiries into the problem consistently showed that it was of limited importance. Serious restrictionism, in fact, was confined to a very few sectors– the printing industry, the docks and shipbuilding– and cannot, anyway, be explained simply in terms of labour intransigence. These facts clearly need to be incorporated in future accounts of Britain's postwar industrial decline.