Innovation,external technical linkages and small firm commercial performance: an empirical analysis from Western New York

This paper examines the role of external service linkages in the innovation and market peformance of small manufacturing firms (SMFs). Survey data from a technological cross-section of 146 Western New York SMFs are summarized. The data suggest a helpful role for consultants in the product development efforts of innovative firms, especially those that serve foreign export markets. Several multiple discriminant models are presented, each of which suggests an interactive connection between SMF commercial performance, externa) technical links, innovation propensity and in-house R&D. It is argued that innovative SMFs that exploit specialized technical services perform significantly better than comparably sized firms that rely solely on in-house resources. It is also argued that the quality of a region's producer service environment may have a significant bearing on the growth potential of its SMF population. The paper concludes by discussing the main academic and public policy implications that flow from the empirical results.     

The Characteristics,Performance and Strategic Behaviour of Merged Versus Non-Merged Establishments in Britain

The paper compares the structural characteristics, market conditions, organizational features, strategic behaviour and performance of merged versus non-merged private business establishments in Britain. The results are based on the analysis of the 1990 Workplace Industrial Relations Survey. The following conclusions are reached: merged establishments tend to be rather old, of small to medium size, more likely to be foreign-owned and to be involved in manufacturing. Compared to non-merged establishments they are likely to operate in international and oligopolistic markets, in multi-products and in conglomerate businesses. The merged manufacturing establishments are more likely to have been involved in restructuring strategies and to have cut jobs and achieved productivity gains. More merged establishments declare a below-average financial performance.     

创新企业营销增强产品价值

日臻完善的市场经济,要求企业营销必须向纵深发展,而处于企业核心地位的营销工作涉及到方方面面,必须从营销理念、营销组织、营销渠道、产品营销、品牌营销、服务营销诸多方面加以推进,以实现企业的可持续发展。     

An Asymptotic Expansion Approach to Pricing Financial Contingent Claims

We propose a new methodology for the valuation problem of financial contingent claims when the underlying asset prices follow a general class of continuous Itô processes. Our method can be applicable to a wide range of valuation problems including contingent claims associated with stocks, foreign exchange rates, the term structure of interest rates, and even their combinations. We illustrate our method by discussing the Black-Scholes economy when the underlying asset prices follow the continuous diffusion processes, which are not necessarily time-homogeneous. The standard Black-Scholes model on stocks and the Cox-Ingersoll-Ross model on the spot interest rate are simple examples. Then we shall give a series of examples on the valuation formulae including plain vanilla options, average options, and other contingent claims. We shall also give some numerical evidence of the accuracy of the approximations we have obtained for practical purposes. Our approach can be rigorously justified by an infinite dimensional mathematics, the Malliavin-Watanabe-Yoshida theory recently developed in stochastic analysis.     

Using surveys of business perceptions as a guide to growth‐enhancing fiscal reforms

This paper assesses the merits of using business perceptions of growth constraints as a guide to growth‐enhancing fiscal policy reforms. Using endogenous growth models in which the government levies an income tax to provide public inputs to the production of private firms, the paper demonstrates that such perceptions of growth constraints may be misleading from a policy perspective. In particular, firms can be expected to systematically overestimate the growth‐enhancing effects of lower tax rates relative to public services and public capital, and underestimate the growth‐enhancing effects of greater provision of public capital relative to taxation and public services. In addition, we show that firms rank different public services and different types of public capital according to the actual costs they impose on firms. It is then shown that these theoretical predictions regarding how firms rank constraints correspond closely to the observed ranking of constraints by firms in the World Bank's Enterprise Surveys.     

基于使用的认知模型与商务语言动态性探析

本文从认知语言学的理论框架和基本知识点出发，从五个方面重点探讨了语言基于使用的认知模型的特点及其意义，以期更好地理解该模型的内涵和理论价值，并用于语言分析。这五个方面分别是语言知识的动态语义建构、语言知识的网络辐射结构、知识结构的图示化表征、语言的构式化体验结构，以及语言知识的文化观照。同时，结合以上研究，我们对商务语言的动态性特点做了针对性分析。     

On automated e‐business negotiations: Goal,policy, strategy,and plans of decision and action

In recent years, there has been increasing interest in automated e‐business negotiations. The automation of negotiation requires a decision model to capture the negotiation knowledge of policymakers and negotiation experts so that the decision‐making process can be carried out automatically. Current research on automated e‐business negotiations has focused on defining low‐level tactics (or negotiation rules) so that automated negotiation systems can carry out automated negotiation processes. These low‐level tactics are usually defined from a technical perspective, not from a business perspective. There is a gap between high‐level business negotiation goals and low‐level tactics. In this article, we distinguish the concepts of negotiation context, negotiation goals, negotiation strategy, and negotiation tactics and introduce a formal decision model to show the relations among these concepts. We show how high‐level negotiation goals can be formally mapped to low‐level tactics that can be used to affect the behavior of a negotiation system during the negotiation process. In business, a business organization faces different negotiation situations (or contexts) and determines different sets of goals for different negotiation contexts. In our decision model, a business policymaker sets negotiation goals from different perspectives, which are called goal dimensions. A negotiation policy is a functional mapping from a negotiation context to some quantitative measures (or goal values) for the goal dimensions to express how competitive the policymaker wants to reach that set of goals. A negotiation expert who has the experience and expertise to conduct negotiations would define the negotiation strategies needed for reaching the negotiation goals. Formally, a negotiation strategy is a functional mapping from a set of goal values to a set of decision‐action rules that implement negotiation tactics. The selected decision‐action rules can then be used to control the execution of an automated negotiation system, which conducts a negotiation on behalf of a business organization.     

Slow Recoveries: A Structural Interpretation

An analysis of the performance of GDP, employment, and other labor market variables following the troughs in postwar U.S. business cycles points to much slower recoveries in the three most recent episodes, but does not reveal any significant change over time in the relation between GDP and employment. This leads us to characterize the last three episodes as slow recoveries, as opposed to jobless recoveries. We use the estimated New Keynesian model in Galí, Smets, and Wouters (2011) to provide a structural interpretation for the slower recoveries since the early nineties.     

能力本位的项目化改造之高职商务英语教学改革探索

由于社会对外语人才的需求呈多元化趋势,过去那种单一外语专业和基础技能型的人才已不能适应市场经济的需求。必须通过教学改革以实现商务英语人才培养质量的提高,而能力本位的教育为此指明了方向,项目化改造为此提供了一种实现的途径。     

大学英语教学如何促进现代商业职业人才培养目标的实现

大学英语教学对现代商业职业人才的培养起着非常主要的作用。新的大学英语教学观的树立、教学内容的组织、教学方法的采用、评价方式的改进、第二课堂活动的开展和师资队伍的建设等方面将会使大学英语教学更加适应商业职业院校特色,从而促进现代商业职业人才的培养。