Corporates' strategic responses to economic policy uncertainty in China

Using a novel news‐based index of economic policy uncertainty, this paper studies the impact of economic policy uncertainty on corporate strategic positioning and corporate risk in China from 2009 to 2015. The study also investigates the impact of corporate strategic positioning on corporate risk. The results show that corporate strategic positioning and economic policy uncertainty have a significant positive impact on corporate risk. The results also explain that economic policy uncertainty increases the market risk of the firms irrespective of their corporate strategy. However, it increases the business risk of prospector firms and decreases the business risk of defensive firms. The study may help the firms to formulate and improve their strategic positioning while considering economic policy uncertainty. Our results are robust to alternate proxies of economic policy uncertainty and corporate risk.     

Brand in the hand: A cross-market investigation of consumer acceptance of mobile marketing

Given the great potential of developing marketing campaigns delivered via mobile devices and the evolution of near-field communication technologies, this study examines factors influencing consumers’ acceptance of untethered, or mobile, marketing across three influential markets: the United States, China, and Europe. We examine the extent to which the usefulness of mobile information/programs and individual characteristics—namely innovativeness, personal attachment, and risk avoidance—jointly influence attitudes toward mobile marketing, and how the latter influences consumers’ mobile marketing activity across three large and influential markets. We found perceived usefulness, consumer innovativeness, and personal attachment to directly influence attitudes toward mobile marketing in all three markets. In China and Europe, risk avoidance also negatively influences attitudes toward mobile marketing. Marketers seeking to build and maintain customer relationships via mobile platforms should view these individual characteristics as levers brands can push to amplify consumers’ acceptance of mobile marketing.     

Determinants of IT Usage and New Product Performance*

Explosive growth of information technologies (IT) has prompted interest in examining the role of IT in new product development (NPD). Through desktop software and Web‐based tools, IT has been used to aid idea generation and product testing as well as for NPD activities such as process and portfolio management. Recent research suggests, however, that a gap exists between IT availability and usage. Given the importance of IT in creating business value through the development of new products and services, the present study seeks to identify factors that affect IT usage. Further, anecdotal evidence and conceptual studies intimate that the usage of IT tools for NPD can shorten time to market, can improve product quality, and can increase productivity. However, empirical substantiation of this impact is mostly nonexistent. The current study investigates the relationship between IT usage and two measures of new product performance: speed to market and market performance. Employing a mail‐survey methodology, the study uses data from a sample of practitioner members from the Product Development & Management Association to examine the effect of project risk, existence of a champion, autonomy, innovative climate, IT infrastructure, and IT embeddedness on the extent of IT usage. These data are also used to explore the impact of IT usage on speed to market and market performance. The results indicate that project risk, existence of a champion, and IT embeddedness positively affect the extent of IT usage for NPD. Additionally, IT usage positively and significantly influences the performance of the new product in the marketplace. Surprisingly, and contrary to popular belief, IT usage does not have any impact on speed to market. An important implication of this study is that IT usage influences performance but not in the way managers expect. Specifically, IT usage does not seem to affect speed to market but rather positively impacts the performance of the new product in the marketplace. This result suggests that IT usage in NPD provides far more value to firms than previously thought and provides evidence to support greater investments in IT for product development efforts. Other implications of the study are that unless IT is embedded into the NPD process and champions for IT tools exist, chances are that IT will not be used and its benefits will not be realized.     

Market inefficiencies surrounding energy announcements

We use sequential energy inventory announcements to shed new light on the informational efficiency of financial markets. Our findings provide clear evidence of inefficiency in crude oil futures and stock markets. This inefficiency can be exploited by sophisticated traders. We examine the effect of market liquidity on the efficient incorporation of information in this setting. We also construct a predictor that can predict inventory surprises and preannouncement returns in-sample and out-of-sample. Finally, we develop a combination forecast that can be used as a proxy for market expectations of oil inventory announcements.     

Hedging performance of multiscale hedge ratios

In this study, the wavelet multiscale model is applied to selected assets to hedge time-dependent exposure of an agent with a preference for a certain hedging horizon. Based on the in-sample and out-of-sample portfolio variances, the wavelet-based generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH) model produces the lowest variances. From a utility standpoint, wavelet networks combined with GARCH have the highest utility. Finally, the wavelet-GARCH model has the lowest minimum capital risk requirements. Overall, the wavelet GARCH and wavelet networks offer improvements over traditional hedging models.     

Consumers un-tethered: A three-market empirical study of consumers' mobile marketing acceptance

This study examines factors influencing consumers' acceptance of mobile marketing across three influential markets, namely U.S., China, and Europe. The authors develop an integrative conceptual model on consumers' attitudes and behaviors toward mobile marketing. The authors incorporate three individual-level characteristics, namely personal attachment, innovativeness, and risk avoidance and investigate how permission-based acceptance influences the relationship between consumers' attitude and mobile marketing activity. Focusing on Generation Y consumers, the model is empirically tested with data from U.S., China, and Europe. The findings illustrate several cross-market differences and similarities regarding the relationships between individual-level characteristics, attitude, and mobile marketing activity. Research and managerial implications of these findings are discussed.     

An identity for the product moments of order statistics

A general identity for the product moments of successive order statistics is given, which is valid in a class of probability distributions including Weibull, Pareto, exponential and Burr distributions.     

Individual psychology of risk-taking behaviours in non-adherence

This paper presents some theoretical considerations based on the theories of risk about non-adherence in the field of health care. Traditional models as the Health Belief Model and the Theory of Reasoned Action are presented and criticized. In order to enable the use of other theoretical frameworks, it is argued that non-adherence can be studied within the general frame of risk-taking. The behavioural decision theory is presented and it is argued that cognitive biases like unrealistic optimism play a major role in non-adherence as in risk-taking. It is also argued that these cognitive biases depend on self-related motivation factors. Results of a pilot study involving 16 patients are presented. These results only partly support the theoretical analysis and underline that it would be necessary to take mood factors into consideration in further research.     

Passage on the rope bridge between science and technology: Tales of valor with virtue and vanity with vertigo

The decline of U.S. productivity and competitiveness has been represented as a death by a thousand cuts. Remedies, however, must center on something more than a thousand band-aids. They are best directed to the critical determinants of decline. Next to the need to undertake a radical restructuring of education, we must secure a much more effective exploitation of scientific advance already in hand. This essay does not propose a redistribution of funds away from science to make technology transfer affordable. It urges much expanded attention within the academy to competitiveness issues centering on process and product innovation. There is little attention here to the well-deserved accolades enjoyed by science; this essay focuses instead on the sources of vertigo we collectively suffer in effecting the science-to-technology passage, represented metaphorically as a rope bridge. The catalog of causes for the fragile nature of that construct is followed with suggestions for giving it tensile strength.