Following the Crowd—Does Crowdfunding Affect Venture Capitalists’ Selection of Entrepreneurial Ventures?

Given the increasing popularity of crowdfunding as a new means to finance entrepreneurial ventures, we assess whether and how crowdfunding campaign‐specific signals that affect campaign success influence venture capitalists’ selection decisions in ventures’ follow‐up funding process. Our study relies on cross‐referencing a proprietary data set of 56,000 crowdfunding campaigns that ran on Kickstarter between 2009 and 2016 with 100,000 investments in the same period from the Crunchbase data set. Drawing on signaling theory and the microfinance literature, our empirical findings reveal that a successful crowdfunding campaign leads to a higher likelihood to receive follow‐up venture capital (VC) financing, and that there exists an inverted U‐shaped relationship between the funding‐ratio and the probability to receive VC funding. Further, we find statistical evidence that an endorsement by the platform provider has a likewise positive impact on the receipt of VC. Contrary to our expectations, word‐of‐mouth volume seems to be a negligible factor when it comes to follow‐up VC financing. Our results support the view that crowdfunding signals are factored into the VC’s funding decision in order to evaluate the potential of entrepreneurial ventures.     

University–industry linkage evolution: an empirical investigation of relational success factors

University–industry linkages (UILs) offer an array of benefits for the parties involved and the economy at large; however, research provides limited theoretical development and practical advice on successfully managing UILs from initial negotiations to project completion and beyond. This paper, thus, empirically investigates the impact of relational success factors (communication, trust, understanding, individuals) on UIL performance across three phases of evolution, accounting for the changing manifestations of these factors over time. Communication emerged as a consistent predictor of success, with positive interrelationships between individuals advancing all relational success factors across all phases. A positive effect of trust and understanding, however, only emerged for some relationship phases. Results provide managers with insight into forms relational drivers take throughout long‐lasting successful UILs.     

How to motivate people to put their money where their mouth is: What makes employees participate in electronic prediction markets?

Although prediction markets are widely acknowledged to be as effective as other institutions predicting future events, little is known regarding their application in organizational settings. For organizations, prediction markets offer a new technical possibility to make use of the beliefs, information and knowledge of their employees for organizational decisions and forecasts. Based on survey data of 147 users in German-speaking Europe, we show that expected rewards increase user satisfaction. While contribution effort and general reciprocity in isolation have no impact on satisfaction, perceived general reciprocity in conjunction with high rewards is likely to increase user satisfaction. Our findings extend our knowledge on user behavior and emphasize the importance of incentives in prediction markets.     

The Impact of Host Community on Destination (re)branding: A Case Study of Hiroshima

This paper investigates local groups’ opinions on interpreting a dark heritage site for the promotion of tourism and analyzes their roles in tourism activities, through a case study of Hiroshima, Japan. As the first city suffered nuclear bombing, Hiroshima is a primary tourism destination in Japan but faced the challenge of revitalization. Fieldwork investigation methods, including semi‐structured interviews, were applied. The results suggest that local people hold favorable attitudes toward tourism development. They conduct an alternative approach to rejuvenating Hiroshima by identifying the essence of the place – a cheerful and peaceful city – and incorporating it into tourism events. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Absorbing partner knowledge in R&D collaborations – the influence of founders on potential and realized absorptive capacity

We investigate whether founder participation in research and development collaborations enhances the two dimensions of absorptive capacity (ACAP): potential ACAP and realized ACAP. Based on a longitudinal firm-patent dataset of over 700 collaborations, and using a novel measure of ACAP, we find that founder involvement enhances potential ACAP provided the knowledge bases of focal firm and partner are related. Once knowledge has been absorbed, founder involvement increases realized ACAP irrespective of relatedness. Thus, we highlight the merit of treating the dimensions of ACAP separately by showing differing effects of founder involvement. Our paper emphasizes the outstanding role founders play in the R&D process of their firms. Firms should consider carefully the allocation of team members to R&D projects because team members differ with respect to their ACAP.     

The impact of face-to-face street fundraising on organizational reputation

Although many stakeholders perceive face-to-face street fundraising as unpleasant, nonprofit managers encourage it as a way to attract donors. To understand the long-term effects of this fundraising method, we used a mixed-methods experimental design to investigate how face-to-face street fundraising affects organizational reputation and stakeholder support intentions in comparison with letter fundraising. The findings reveal that face-to-face street fundraising has a significant negative influence on the stakeholders' perceptions of an organization. Further, qualitative data show that the negative perception originates primarily from perceived pressure, distrust, and obtrusion, which are triggered by face-to-face street fundraising. Our study thus reveals long-term reputational consequences that nonprofit organizations should consider before deciding on fundraising methods.     

Schumpeterian competition in heterogeneous oligopolies

The modeling of Schumpeterian competition as a process of innovation, imitation and selection was first presented by Nelson/Winter (1982) in a simulation study and further analyzed in a similar but general analytical formulation by Iwai (1984a, 1984b). Their results concerning the relations between the combination of the different forces of Schumpeterian competition and market structure respectively the distributions of profits are interesting, but restricted to competitive markets. Comparing rules of thumb and satisficing for the Ramp;D decisions the present study analyzes the process of Schumpeterian competition in a heterogeneous oligopoly. Firstly, the authors find for the Ramp;D-concentration relation results contrary to the traditional interpretation of Schumpeter. Secondly, Iwai’s (1984a, 1984b) qualitative results hold in this less restrictive modeling.     

Determinants of Community‐Based Sponsorship Impact on Self‐Congruity

Sponsors increasingly shift from large professional to community‐based properties, as these can deliver an engaged audience and enable them to demonstrate their corporate social responsibility (CSR). This research comprises two studies and shows that community‐based sponsorship may improve CSR image and, in turn, self‐congruity, a key determinant of consumer behavior. Study 1 investigates perceived sponsor–club fit, confirming attitude and corporate positioning similarity as relevant predictors. Importantly, CSR image similarity does not impact fit, suggesting sponsorship opportunities for organizations independent of their initial CSR image. Study 2 shows perceived sponsor CSR image to mediate the relationship between the perceptions of a community‐based property's CSR image and consumers' self‐congruity with the sponsor. While perceived sponsor–club fit and sponsorship awareness moderate the relationship between property and sponsor CSR image, attitudes toward CSR moderate the association between sponsor CSR and self‐congruity. The paper concludes with implications and future research directions.