Infrastructure investment on the margins of the market: The role of niche infrastructure providers in the UK

Across Europe, policymakers and market forces are striving to deploy next generation access (NGA) networks and ensure ubiquitous access to superfast broadband services. Due to scale economies and sunk costs, the roll-out of NGA is expected to be profitable only for large-scale providers and in densely populated areas. Nonetheless, alternative providers, such as utilities and local communities, have significantly contributed to NGA diffusion in many countries. Over the past five years, several small-scale initiatives have emerged in the UK, bringing fibre networks to urban and rural areas previously overlooked by either commercial or subsidised deployments. A multiple case study approach is employed here to explore the nature and the drivers of niche providers in the UK NGA market. All these initiatives are demand-driven and to follow a modular approach. Despite adopting different business models, they all rely on the resources inherited from past broadband initiatives and relationships with local partners. By investigating the strategies of niche providers in NGA market, this analysis sheds light on their contribution to bridging the digital divide in the UK and is presented as a preliminary assessment of their sustainability and potential growth.     

Financial liberalization and bank risk-taking: International evidence

This paper analyzes the channels through which financial liberalization affects bank risk-taking in an international sample of 4333 banks in 83 countries. Our results indicate that financial liberalization increases bank risk-taking in both developed and developing countries but through different channels. Financial liberalization promotes stronger bank competition that increases risk-taking incentives in developed countries, whereas in developing countries it increases bank risk by expanding opportunities to take risk. Capital requirements help reduce the negative impact of financial liberalization on financial stability in both developed and developing countries. However, official supervision and financial transparency are only effective in developing countries.     

Managing digital business platforms: A continued exercise in balancing renewal and refinement

Central to the evolution of a digital business platform is the organization’s ability to balance exploration (renewal) and exploitation (refinement) simultaneously. Drawing on prior research—including digital platforms, contradictory tensions, and organizational ambidexterity—and our own experience investigating digital business platforms in organizations, this article provides insights into how executives can manage this evolution successfully. More specifically, we present a framework recognizing three pairs of organizational capabilities (i.e., identifying-nourishing, expanding-legitimating, and augmenting-embedding) that enable balancing renewal and refinement of the platform over time. We close by providing critical managerial practices that executives can use in anticipating, adjusting, and evaluating the evolution of a digital business platform over time, including its initiation, development, and growth.     

The synergistic effect of insurance and banking sector activities on economic growth in Africa

It is widely understood that the insurance and banking sectors of every economy perform some functions in driving economic growth. What is not yet well documented is whether their roles are complimentary or substitutive. With the aid of the dynamic panel generalized method of moments (GMM) estimation technique, this paper evaluates the synergistic effect of both sectors on economic growth in a panel of 10 African countries that are responsible for most of the activities in the continent’s financial sector. The insurance-banking-growth nexus was also examined through bootstrap panel causality tests. The results show that the life insurance market and the banking sector, as well as the non-life insurance market and the banking sector, are complimentary. We find that, overall, the relationship between the insurance and banking sectors in Africa is a complimentary one and that their synergistic impact on economic growth is positive. The feedback hypothesis was also confirmed in the relationship between the insurance sector and economic growth and between the banking sector and economic growth.     

Leadership succession planning for today’s digital transformation economy: Key factors to build for competency and innovation

Digital transformation is rapidly changing the competitive landscape and the war on talent for today’s organizations. As part of this economy, organizations and their HR units must continuously reevaluate leadership structures and practices that exploit core competencies while allowing for innovation (i.e., leadership ambidexterity) and incorporate big data with predictive analytics. In this vein, understanding how HR executives can create better solutions around this problem remains sparse. Specifically, what frameworks can HR executives apply to identify potential alignment failures in leadership succession planning in light of newer emerging markets? What internal decision-making traps need to be recognized? Finally, what specific forms of data and evidence must test these plans for relevance and recharge and renew the talent-to-strategy pipeline? In this article, we examine these questions by reviewing the gaps in the literature and identifying through our four-step model how organizations can incorporate ambidexterity-building as a leadership succession planning practice.     

The antecedents of digital collaboration through an enhanced digital platform for destination management: A micro-DMO perspective

While the tourism sector shifts towards digital transformation, Destination Management Organisations (DMOs) often struggle to adapt to their changing technological environment. This study explores the antecedents of digital collaboration and develops a framework for micro-DMOs to enhance effective destination management through digital technologies. An integrated sequential qualitative approach was adopted by conducting multi-phase interviews, in addition to designing and trialling a real-world trial digital platform. The research provides empirical evidence that digital collaboration is essential for micro-DMOs, necessitating them to transform their current “websites” into digital platforms which act as a hub for business stakeholders to actively be involved in. Antecedents of successful digital collaboration include mutuality, trust, control, and leadership which may be manifested differently from non-digital collaboration. Additionally, the study identifies three aspects for digital collaboration; marketing, networking and knowledge sharing that demands specific attention. Our results have theoretical, methodological, and practical implications for academia, industry and policymakers.     

Cashlessness and scalable multi-pay practices: Capturing the everyday financial transactions in local contexts

While macro-level volume growth in India's move towards cashless payment systems is captured relentlessly, most often what gets ignored is a realization that everyday financial transactional practices are socially and culturally embedded in the local contexts. This paper drawn from an anthropological ethnography explores how people use and hierarchically order different payment systems in their everyday financial transactions for products and services. It explores how aspects such as trust, economic and social values, demographic differentials and scalable multi-pay practices influence such ordering and usage of the payment systems within their everyday local contexts.     

Real estate prices and systemic banking crises

The collapse of real estate prices has historically jeopardized banking stability and triggered systemic banking crises. This paper studies risk contagion in a banking system in real estate price shock by adopting complex network theory. Modelling the real estate-related asset as a common exposure of banks to the real estate market, we propose a model that incorporates two main risk contagion channels, i.e., the financial network and asset fire sales, and reveal how the real estate price shock is transmitted and propagated across banks. We demonstrate that banking stability is highly sensitive to the real estate price shock. Moreover, due to the particularly low liquidity of the real estate market, the asset fire-sales of real estate assets overwhelms the financial network, playing the dominant role in risk contagion. Our model can be adopted by regulators to conduct stress testing and to forge effective risk management strategies.     

A SWOT analysis of China's air cargo sector in the context of COVID-19 pandemic

This paper discusses the situation of China's air cargo sector facing the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on the expectation that it can go out of recession more easily than China's air passenger sector, this paper analyzes four aspects that are favorable and unfavorable for its further development: (1) strengths (China's sustainable economic basis and proliferating cargo suppliers), (2) weaknesses (insufficient cargo capacity and less business internationalization), (3) opportunities (top authority support, rising e-commerce demand, and new technological momentum), and (4) challenges (uncertain trade environment and increasing profitability pressure). Then this paper suggests strategies for China's air cargo suppliers to adapt to the pandemic.     

Digital gaming culture in Vietnam: an exploratory study

ABSTRACT

New information and communication technologies continue to spread rapidly into the Asian marketplace, which has led to new patterns of leisure consumption, one of the most popular being digital gaming. However, in Vietnam there is limited research on gaming as a leisure activity. The purpose of this study is to explore the phenomenon of digital gaming in Vietnam to better understand how it is practiced in this culture. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with twenty-five gaming industry figures and gamers. Thematic analysis was used to guide data collection and analysis. The findings indicate that glocalisation, socialised gaming practices and competitiveness characterise the Vietnamese gaming experience. The distinct culture of Vietnam combined with globalised gaming consumption habits has created new modes of play culture, and hence leisure experiences that are growing in pervasive and influential ways.