Product innovation for the people's car in an emerging economy

As product offerings of multinational enterprises (MNEs) continue to primarily serve the relatively well-to-do consumers in emerging economies, innovations to meet the unique affordability and acceptability criteria of masses at the base of the pyramid (BoP) continues to remain a daunting challenge. The academic literature is sparse on comprehensive in-depth studies about the intricate processes involved in shaping and managing technology development for the masses. Focusing on product innovation by Tata Motors of India with the Nano—the world's cheapest car, our case study aims to understand how the innovator's choices regarding the use of technology, product design and organizational practices for new product development enabled it to meet the challenge of innovation for India's masses. Drawing on Christensen's work on disruptive innovations, our analysis shows how frugal use of resources through a new combination of existing component technologies created a new modular product to achieve the unique price–performance requirements demanded by the BoP. Our findings show that collaboration with suppliers for component design and their early integration in the design phase substantially lowered costs and helped eliminate unnecessary frills whilst incorporating features valued by mass markets. Our study has important managerial implications for MNEs and provides critical insights into the processes for a new blueprint for an untapped market segment in the automobile industry.     

Welfare Effect of Mergers and Multilateral Trade Liberalization

In a two‐country model where firms behave à la Cournot, we show that trade liberalization increases (decreases) the social desirability of those mergers that generate sufficiently large (small) reductions in marginal cost. There exists a range of intermediate levels of marginal cost savings such that marginal tariff reductions increase (decrease) the desirability of merger at sufficiently low (high) tariff levels. Moreover, in the neighborhood of free trade, we show that if trade liberalization increases the profitability of a merger, it necessarily also increases its desirability.     

Regularity conditions and scope estimates: The case of large-sized U.S. banks

We consider economies and diseconomies of scope for large U.S. banks by employing ordinary and hybrid translog cost functions. We examine the regularity conditions in output space where scope estimates are calculated and reject all models for which these conditions fail. The translog model always possesses violations. For the hybrid translog, violations occur in every case except one. In this one case, we find economies of scope.     

Tests of Income Pooling on Household Budget Data: The Australian Evidence

The unitary household model implies pooling of all individual incomes. This study distinguishes between various types of income pooling and tests them on Australian household income/expenditure data. The tests recognise the endogeneity of both earned and unearned income and are performed using a 3 SLS estimation procedure that allows feedback between the various equations. The results support income pooling for some items, though not for others. Moreover, income pooling across gender seems much less likely for old people than for the younger individuals. The study, also, provides evidence on the interaction between the various types of income.     

Gender Differences in Economic Knowledge: A Reevaluation of the Evidence

This study examines the importance and significance of male-female differences in understanding and learning economics and attempts to assess whether the use of multiple choice questions, rather than essay questions, contributes to these measured differences. Do multiple choice questions favor men with their possibly superior spatial and numerical skills? Do essay questions favor women with their possibly superior verbal skills? Evidence based on a study involving 589 students using an examination including both types of questions is analyzed in this article.     

20年来在维修与可靠性工程专业推行校外读研的经验

大部分从事维修与可靠性专业的人员在其工作期间都受过短期课目培训。不过，许多人认为，具有评定意义的正规学习对他们的工作和所在公司来说，会在那些具有实用价值的技能和知识方面得到进一步提升。从20世纪80年代中期开始，澳大利亚莫纳什大学（Monash University）那些不能到校内上课的工程师们，开设了维修管理专业的研究生课程。后来又开设了可靠性工程的课程，1998年这两个课程合并成为了硕士学位课程。现在全世界已有几百名学生从这个专业毕业。随着在网络增强式教学方面的进展，这个项目有了重大的发展，2006年学习这个课程的学生已经遍及五大洲19个国家。丈中介绍这个课程的发展和演变以及一些经验教训，同时也列举出了毕业生们从中所能得到若干益处。     

JOB DESIGN AND PRODUCTIVITY

Six years ago a small research unit was established at the Management Centre of the University of Bradford, with the purpose of investigating the effects of changes in job design and job content on worker productivity. Since that time a number of studies have been completed, and the philosophy and strategy of the programme of research have changed. This paper describes the evolution of the project and summarizes the major results obtained up to the present date.