Residential grid storage technology battles: a multi-criteria analysis using BWM

This article focuses on the battle for dominance between various battery technologies in the residential grid storage market (< 10?KWh) in the context of residential energy systems and the related home energy management systems. We focus on five major battery technologies that are available in the market (lithium-based batteries, lead-based batteries, flow batteries, nickel-based batteries, and sodium-based batteries). Based on a literature review and expert interviews, we study the factors for technology success in the residential grid storage market. By applying the best worst method (BWM), we assign the relative importance to the factors and predict which technology will have the highest chance of achieving success. We compare this to the technology that now has the highest market share and conclude that BWM is a useful method to indicate technology dominance in this market.     

From Origination to Renegotiation: A Comparison of Portfolio and Securitized Commercial Real Estate Loans

We examine long-run house price convergence across the twenty Paris districts using a quarterly dataset that spans from 1991 to 2014. Our approach is based on two stages. In the first stage, we apply methods of unit root testing. Our econometric modelling exercise adopts a pair wise approach that is built on a probabilistic test for convergence based on all house price differentials across the Paris districts. We find that more than 50 % of the intra-city house price differentials that can be computed are stationary. In the second stage of our investigation, we analyse the drivers of convergence. The probability of stationarity is negatively affected by unemployment differentials across districts, demographics differentials and supply-side characteristics. Our findings further reveal that the half-life of a shock to long-run price equilibrium is affected positively by unemployment, distance and housing supply. Our analysis suggests that smaller distances between Parisian districts are associated with a faster speed of adjustment back towards long-run equilibrium.     

The predictive ability of entity-wide geographic sales disclosures: IAS 14R versus IFRS 8

This report examines the predictive value of geographic revenue disclosures under IFRS 8 in forecasting company revenues using four forecast models. The findings show that the predictive accuracy of IFRS 8 entity-wide geographic sales significantly outperform consolidated sales in forecasting consolidated sales one year out. The results indicate that the predictive ability of country specific entity wide geographic sales improves on average by six percent when geographic sales are reported for country of domicile or by each individually material country. The study also finds that geographic sales disclosures by companies located in countries with high and moderate enforcement regimes improve the predictive accuracy of geographic sales by five percent. These results provide evidence that the disclosure of finer geographic sales data is more decision useful and associated with improved predictive accuracy for large listed companies in Europe, Australia and New Zealand.     

Andries Sternheim and the study of leisure in the early critical theory

The issue of pornography as a form of leisure practice has received little attention from researchers. In this study, the impact of pornography consumption on women's lives was examined. A diverse group of thirty-two women was interviewed, with discussion focusing on their individual experiences, meanings, and perceptions of pornography. The women's reactions to pornography, especially to violent pornography, were consistently negative. Pornography elicited fear reactions, had a negative effect on women's identities and on their relationships with men, and was seen to reinforce sexist attitudes among men. Despite this, many of the women felt that their opinions were not ‘legitimate’, and overt resistance to pornography was often muted. The findings are discussed in terms of the role of pornography in the reproduction of gender, the ideology of individualism, and the potential for resistance among women.     

The impact of functional integration on perceived risk and consumer-based brand equity

Consumers today have access to a wide span of corporate information and are increasingly aware of the degree to which the functional areas of marketing and supply chain activities are becoming more integrated. Functional integration involves coordinating supply- and demand-focused activities and is theorized to create two interrelated benefits for consumers: lower perceived purchase risk and, ultimately, higher consumer-based brand equity. Despite an emphasis on the important role of consumers in the functional integration literature, the consumers’ viewpoint is missing. This research addresses this gap using a survey and an experiment to investigate the impact of functional integration on consumers’ perceptions of risk and consumer-based brand equity. Findings suggest that when functional integration acts as a component of brand association, purchase risk decreases and consumer-based brand equity increases. The results can help scholars and practitioners better understand the role of functional integration by advancing the nomological net of brand associations as part of the standard marketing mix.     

The Power of Innovativeness in Manufacturer–Retailer Relationships

ABSTRACT

Purpose: Retailers often challenge manufacturers through aggressive store brand policies and severe listing constraints. This study investigates manufacturer innovativeness as a managerial lever to shift the power balance between manufacturers and retailers.

Methodology/approach: Using data from 277 senior managers of Swiss and German consumer goods manufacturers and analyzing these data with structural equation modelling, the authors test hypotheses about the impact of manufacturer innovativeness on manufacturer–retailer relationship characteristics (i.e., retailer dependency, store brand aggressiveness, and listing constraints).

Findings: The study demonstrates that manufacturer innovativeness enhances retailer dependency, which in turn positively affects overall manufacturer performance. This relationship can be explained further: By increasing retailer dependency, manufacturers suppress retailers’ store brand aggressiveness and attenuate retailers’ listing constraints. Store brand aggressiveness affects overall manufacturer performance through listing constraints.

Research implications: Identifying levers such as innovativeness that assist manufacturers in fostering their power over retailers provides a new mode for understanding how manufacturers can influence the balance of power between manufacturers and retailers. The study provides support for the approach/inhibition theory of power on the inter-organizational level. Organizations with increased power are assumed to have approach-related tendencies and act in goal-consistent manner, whereas organizations with reduced power are assumed to develop the tendency to pursue inhibition-related actions, e.g., attending to threats. Furthermore, this study identifies channel relationship characteristics such as retailer dependency as a mediating path between manufacturer innovativeness and performance.

Practical implications: Managers need to strengthen the firm’s innovative capacity to enhance the performance of their companies. By developing the capability to provide radical innovations, manufacturers are able to enhance their performance not only directly but also indirectly by strengthening the manufacturer’s position with regard to retailers. This study underscores the relevance of innovativeness for strengthening the manufacturer’s position in its relationship with retailers that avoids problems with aggressive store brands and constrained listing conditions.

Originality/value/contribution: This study proposes manufacturer innovativeness as a managerial lever to shift the power balance between manufacturers and retailers.     

Technological and geographic heterogeneity in broadband markets: The challenge for regulation

When the telecommunications industry was liberalised in Europe and North America in the 1980s and 1990s, it inherited a legacy of monopoly providers whose footprint was national or multi-regional in its character. The regulatory framework, particularly that adopted in EU member states, reflected this pattern of relatively homogeneous deployment achieved, in part, by decades of cross-subsidised pricing and universal service goals. Perhaps because of this legacy, telecommunications regulators have often adopted the presumption that relevant markets are national in character, unless proven otherwise Although geographically-variegated regulatory remedies have been permitted (even in the face of allegedly national relevant markets) and adopted in many member states, many regulators have never done so, and overly cautious thresholds for permitting geographically based forbearance suggest a continued bias towards presuming national markets and remedies. We find that this presumption of uniformity and the tendency to aggregate geographic markets together is not supported by first principles of antitrust analysis, although there may have been strong practical reasons to apply this presumption in the past circumstances of the telecommunications and broadband industries.On the ground, however, there has arguably never been as much heterogeneity across geographies and across technological solutions that provide effective ultra-fast broadband speeds. Both technological (i.e., product market) and geographic heterogeneity are likely to increase with the advent of mobile 5G networks. With their deployment, a cautious regulatory stance towards geographic variation and a cautious regulatory stance towards inter-technology or inter-modal competition may result in regulation that could exceed what is required to ensure effective competition and could instead distort the incentives to enter of facilities-based actors. This may also result in higher-cost and inefficient investment. A more geographically varied and technologically agnostic regulatory framework may satisfy the principle of proportionate and focused regulation—with the possibility that the locus of regulation shifts from the access network to bottleneck facilities such as fibre, ducts and poles.This discussion is especially germane when one considers the highly speculative nature of forecasts and projections about future demand, and the competing claims of proponents of 5G and fibre. While there is some scepticism about the performance of mobile networks, we note that pure mobile and fixed 5G services may have synergies in deployment, and that the idea of competing with residential broadband services is a core strategy of very influential large-scale industry actors. In terms of a future research agenda, regulatory decisions could benefit from much more research into the relationship between domestic and global bandwidth constraints and their influence on development of software and application, as well as much more quantitative research by academics on the drivers of bandwidth demand. The risks associated with promoting investment that results in large-scale wasted resources should also be central to the regulatory agenda.     

Global restructuring—a place for ecology?

This introductory article summarizes the discussions and results of the Fifth Annual Greening of Industry Conference, Global Restructuring—A Place for Ecology?, held in Heidelberg, Germany, November 25–27, 1997. The Greening of Industry Network is concerned with the transition of industry towards sustainable production as an essential part of achieving a sustainable society. The Network conferences, held at different locations around the world, promote this goal by bringing together participants from different regions and with different backgrounds (academia, industry, governments and NGOs). The conferences are venues for information exchange, learning and dialogue about different aspects of the greening of industry and possible pathways to a sustainable society. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.