AN EMPIRICAL TEST OF THE RESOURCE-BASED THEORY: STRATEGIC REGULATION IN THE DUTCH AUDIT INDUSTRY

The resource-based view of the firm is a recent strategic management theory that seeks to identify the resources that may provide firms with a sustainable competitive advantage. This paper has two purposes. First, the paper relates strategic management arguments to parallel lines of reasoning in industrial organization theory and argues that strategic regulation is a major source of sustainable competitive advantage. The second purpose of the paper is to report the results of an empirical test of the resource-based theory on the basis of a longitudinal data set on the postwar history of the Dutch audit industry. A key determinant of this history proves to be strategic regulation, which stimulates demand for audit services and protects rent-producing resources.     

QUANTIFYING THE SCOPE FOR EFFICIENCY DEFENSE IN MERGER CONTROL: THE WERDEN‐FROEB‐INDEX*

This paper introduces the Werden‐Froeb Index (WFI) to assist in evaluating merger‐specific efficiencies in horizontal mergers. The index measures the weighted average reduction in marginal costs required to restore pre‐merger equilibrium prices and quantities after the (full or partial) merger is consummated. The WFI is well defined, objective and robust, and it has relatively low information requirements. We propose to use the index as a natural complement to concentration measures such as the Hirschmann‐Herfindahl Index in the assessment of horizontal mergers.     

Statistische eigenschappen van een vlambeveiliging met behulp van een gasontladingsbuis welke gevoelig is voor ultraviolet licht

Summary  The output voltage of a detector circuit containing a gas-filled tube sensitive to ultraviolet radiation can be used to indicate whether a flame is still burning or not. As long as the flame is burning the random nature of the discharges of the tube leads to random fluctuations in the output voltage, which can be considered as a Markov-process with dependent increments. The problem is to select an alarm level for the output voltage with a suitable chosen probability of exceedance while the flame is burning, in order to limit the probability of false alarm. In this article a method is given for determining upper and lower bounds for the distribution function of the output voltage at any moment, answering the question of the alarm level to be chosen. Results are given for a special circuit.