Founders' Characteristics,Venture Capital Syndication and Governance in Entrepreneurial IPOs

Using a unique sample of 444 entrepreneurial IPOs in the UK and France this paper examines links between founders' characteristics, venture capital (VC) syndication and the development of effective boards in entrepreneurial firms. It argues that VC-backed IPOs suffer from two sets of agency problems which are related to principal-agent and principal-principal relationships between the founders and members of the VC syndicate. The empirical evidence shows that there is a curvilinear relationship between the intensity of founders' external ties and VC syndication. Founders' retained share ownership is negatively associated with VC syndication. We also find that in syndicated IPOs there is a higher involvement of passive private equity firms and “business angels” investing alongside VC firms, both in terms of their number and equity presence. VC-syndicated IPOs have more independent boards than IPOs with no VC involvement. Board independence is negatively associated with founders' retained equity. These results are consistent with the assumption that board independence is used to mitigate agency costs associated with VC involvement in IPO firms. Our findings also identify significant differences in governance characteristics between the UK and France. While French IPOs have less independent boards, they involve more VC backing in general and syndicated VC funding in particular, than UK IPOs.     

Network positioning and R&D activity: a study of Italian groups

Traditionally, R&D studies focus on organisational characteristics and internal context factor effects on a firm's R&D activities. This paper extends previous research by analysing firm–level R&D expenditures in the wider context of inter–organisational networks. Using sample of 2002 manufacturing firms in Italy, it provides evidence that R&D intensity is linked to a firm's positioning within an industrial group's hierarchy. Further tests on the antecedents of R&D expenditures are carried out in relation to the effects of firm characteristics and industry factors. Important findings include a significant and positive association between R&D intensity and the firm's size, performance, intangible assets and industry concentration. These findings suggest that, in addition to firm–level factors and its market environment, network resources and organisation may play an important role in driving the intensity of the firm's R&D expenditures.     

Why do companies issue convertible bond loans? An empirical analysis for the Canadian market

To identify issuer motives, we study the determinants of announcement effects of convertible debt issues in the Canadian market. Classified into equity‐ and debt‐like, wealth effects are significantly more negative for equity‐like convertible bond issuers. Equity‐like convertibles are significantly negatively affected by agency costs of equity. However, agency costs of debt have no significant effect on debt‐like convertibles. Consistent with Stein (1992), this suggests convertibles in particular represent a substitute for equity. Moreover, convertible debt offers announced by income trusts experience significantly less negative wealth effects than offers by nontrusts—a finding explained by a more debt‐like convertible design, very low agency costs of equity in case of income trusts, or both. Copyright © 2008 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Gaming the future of an urban network

Scenario and gaming techniques have a number of complementary characteristics. In this article, the design and evaluation of a gaming-scenario experiment for the exploration of development planning in an urban network in the Netherlands is presented. Two gaming sessions were held using two long-term scenarios (2030) as varying contexts. The combined gaming-scenario approach made it possible to evaluate the impact of external future developments and trends on the administrative and spatial development. Evaluation results of the gaming experiment indicate that the gaming-scenario approach generated new and critical insights on development planning and the future of the urban network. Through the game, the principal, the game leaders but most of all the stakeholder-participants experienced and realized that the management of development planning in urban networks is a very difficult task and is full of pitfalls.     

RETRACTED ARTICLE: Analyzing of innovations influence on economic growth by fuzzy system

Economic growth may be developed on the basis on combination of different factors. In this investigation was analyzed the economic growth prediction based on the innovations by field of technology. Gross domestic product (GDP) was used as economic growth indicator. The method of adaptive neuro fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) was applied to the data in order to detect the influential parameters for the GDP prediction. Five inputs are considered: number of granted patents in electrical engineering, number of granted patents as instruments, number of granted patents in chemistry, number of granted patents in mechanical engineering and the number of granted patents in other fields. Results shown that the innovations in electrical engineering has the highest influence on the GDP prediction.

     

Structural FECM: Cointegration in large‐scale structural FAVAR models

Starting from the dynamic factor model for nonstationary data we derive the factor‐augmented error correction model (FECM) and its moving‐average representation. The latter is used for the identification of structural shocks and their propagation mechanisms. We show how to implement classical identification schemes based on long‐run restrictions in the case of large panels. The importance of the error correction mechanism for impulse response analysis is analyzed by means of both empirical examples and simulation experiments. Our results show that the bias in estimated impulse responses in a factor‐augmented vector autoregressive (FAVAR) model is positively related to the strength of the error correction mechanism and the cross‐section dimension of the panel. We observe empirically in a large panel of US data that these features have a substantial effect on the responses of several variables to the identified permanent real (productivity) and monetary policy shocks.     

Institutional Constraints,Stakeholder Pressure and Corporate Environmental Reporting Policies

Within the theoretical framework of socio‐political economics, and more specifically of stakeholder theory, this work examines whether companies operating under different institutional constraints and stakeholder pressure tend to emphasize different models of corporate environmental reporting. Furthermore, the paper tests whether different corporate environmental reporting policies are driven by the countries' corporate governance systems. A sample of 3931 international companies was examined through a logistic biplot and conditional mean linear regression models. The main results reveal that companies follow two distinct environmental reporting approaches, which depend on specific stakeholders and institutional requirements. The first model, which is followed by firms within codified law countries, mostly focuses on water and emissions. The second approach, mainly followed by companies operating in common law countries, emphasizes materials and energy issues. This finding reveals that companies gradually modify their environmental strategies to make themselves more compatible with the characteristics of the social and institutional environment, which will result in several corporate benefits. The paper provides several outstanding implications for companies' strategic managers, national institutions and firms' stakeholders, especially for investors and customers. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

The interplay of effectuation and causation in decision making: Russian SMEs under institutional uncertainty

The institutional context of Russia and the recent regime of foreign trade sanctions makes it a natural laboratory to study change in decision making regarding the international activities of SMEs. This research explores how the increased institutional uncertainty is evaluated, enacted and responded to by SMEs that are heavily involved in relations with international suppliers. This longitudinal multiple-case study reveals that although firms simultaneously use both causation and effectuation in their decision making, an increase of institutional uncertainty boosts effectuation. The study shows that the intensity of both types of decision-making logic varies along the studied period in accordance to changing perceptions of institutional uncertainty. Also, the studied firms use effectuation logic differently enabling us to distinguish two types of effectuation with contrasting performance implications: opportunity-driven effectuation and survival effectuation.