Internationalisation of Japanese professional business service firms

This paper explores the internationalisation of Japanese professional business service (PBS) firms. The UK was chosen as the geographical area of study due to the large number of Japanese foreign direct investments over the last 20 years. A comparative study of Japanese and Western service providers was conducted in the UK in spring 2002 to ascertain if there are any significant differences in their ways of doing business with Japanese clients. The preliminary results show that Japanese firms tend to be very small in the UK in terms of both size and market share. They seem also to be tightly connected with Japanese businesses operating in the UK.     

新兴高技术企业发展的网络根植性研究

新兴高技术企业的发展取决于其对资源的获取和利用,取决于其与外部网络间的互动联系。新兴高技术企业在获得网络支持的同时,其发展也同时受到网络的约束。以网络根植性理论和资源依赖观点为基础,构建了新兴高技术企业发展的系统进化模型,对其发展的动态过程进行了研究。     

Network embeddedness,headquarters entrepreneurial orientation,and MNE international performance

The aim of this paper is to examine the role played by external and internal network embeddedness in the headquarters entrepreneurial orientation of multinational enterprises (MNEs), and the role of the latter in MNE performance. Drawing on responses from CEOs in a sample of 143 European MNEs, our study offers evidence for the antecedent role of network embeddedness on headquarters entrepreneurial orientation on the one hand, and for the positive impact of headquarters entrepreneurial orientation on international performance on the other. Our findings contribute to the network view of MNEs in the international business and international entrepreneurship literature by disentangling the complex phenomenon of entrepreneurship in MNEs, partly explained by its multiple embeddedness in external and internal networks, and by studying its impact on international performance.     

社会嵌入视角下的能力构建研究

在分析社会网络中不同企业的能力差异后,本文提出了以梯度转移为形式的能力构建模式。社会嵌入机制可以通过强化企业间的网络联结来提供支撑,其中结构嵌入是基于网络特性来拓展联结广度,关系嵌入则基于企业行为来增强联结深度,两者的融合会进一步促进企业的跨组织边界知识互动,以维持能力梯度转移的持续和稳定。     

How to inhibit a partner's strong and weak forms of opportunism: Impacts of network embeddedness and bilateral TSIs

This study investigates the moderating effects of a firm's network embeddedness and a partner's transactional specific investments (TSIs) on relationships between the firm's TSIs and its partner's strong- and weak-form opportunism, and compares the efficiency among these moderator variables. The regression results suggest that (1) a firm's TSIs are positively related to partner's opportunism when network embeddedness and the partner's TSIs are relatively low; but (2) a firm's TSIs are negatively related to partner's opportunism when network embeddedness and the partner's TSIs are relatively high. Furthermore (3) network embeddedness is more effective in inhibiting partner's weak-form opportunism than in inhibiting strong-form opportunism resulting from the firm's TSIs. Finally (4) with regard to the relationship between TSIs and weak-form opportunism, the negative moderating effect of network embeddedness is greater than the negative moderating effect of partner's TSIs. This study explains reasons why conflicting views exist about the relationship between TSIs and partner's opportunism, reveals the differences in the moderating effects of network embeddedness and partner's TSIs, and makes new contributions to both transaction cost theory and embeddedness literature. It also provides, for firms involved in TSIs in a buyer–supplier relationship, insightful managerial suggestions about ways to reduce their partner's varying forms of opportunism.     

The strategic impetus for social network ties: reconstituting broken ceo friendship ties

Research on organization–environment relations has focused primarily on formal linkages between organizations such as board interlock ties as a strategy for managing resource dependence. This study examines whether top corporate executives may maintain more informal ties to executives of other firms in order to manage uncertainty arising from resource dependence. Our point of departure is prior research on boards of directors that has examined whether so‐called ‘broken board ties’ (i.e., ties that are disrupted due to executive turnover) tend to be reconstituted, and whether resource dependence explains the likelihood of reconstitution. These studies have generally provided little evidence that corporate board ties are used to manage resource dependence. We draw from theory and research on social embeddedness and friendship to suggest that, as a strategy for managing dependence, the maintenance of friendship ties between top executives provides benefits that are comparable to the supposed benefits of board cooptation, while imposing fewer constraints on the organization. Our theory leads to the contention that, despite limited prior evidence that resource dependence determines the formation of formal board ties, corporate leaders may nevertheless reconstitute informal (i.e., friendship) ties to leaders of other firms that have the power to constrain their firms' access to needed resources when those ties have been disrupted (e.g., due to turnover of the CEO's friend). We test our hypotheses with a unique dataset that includes survey data from U.S. corporate leaders collected at two points in time, thus permitting an assessment of whether top executives reconstitute broken social ties to leaders of other firms, and whether various sources of resource dependence predict the likelihood of reconstitution. We discuss implications for strategic perspectives on inter‐organizational relations and the sociological literature on embeddedness. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Niche and performance: the moderating role of network embeddedness

What is the relationship between niche and performance? We identify two types of niche positions—product niche and process niche—defined by the extent to which a firm offers distinctive products and has distinctive operational processes, respectively. We argue that the effect of each niche on firm performance is contingent upon network embeddedness—the extent to which a firm is involved in a network of interconnected inter‐firm relationships. Using data covering the period 1995–98 pertaining to venture capital firms and their holdings in initial public offerings (IPOs), we show that both product niche and process niche interact with network embeddedness to determine firm performance. Our findings suggest that the extent to which a firm offers distinctive products or processes will be more positively associated with firm performance when network embeddedness is high. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

论“共主体”营销话语的建构与践行——关于现代营销近视症的矫治研究

本文针对当前营销理论和实践存在的"外形化"问题,梳理了莱维特提出营销近视症后的营销理论发展进路,得出该近视症并没有得到根治而且有新变异的论断和具有主体中心论特征与弊端的现代营销近视症;认为要根治该近视症,首先应克服"现代营销者研究现代营销"以及由此产生的"营销研究的近视症"局限,以营销研究者的身份、在跨学科和方法论高度与层面去寻求突破性思路和方法。基于这种认识,本文萃取和应用"后现代性"、"主体间性"与"网络嵌入性"等多学科话语作为矫治这种营销近视症的创新方法,重构了具有"消解对立、善待他者、与他者网络化互嵌共生"意蕴的共主体营销新话语,并论述了践行这种营销新话语的方式、机理和愿景。     

创业成长中双重网络嵌入的演化规律研究——以正泰集团和温氏集团为例

新企业在创建、存活和成长过程中,需要通过嵌入社会关系网络获得资源支持,嵌入产业网络获得产业链分工协作收益。创业网络是社会网络和产业网络的有机统一体,创业成长过程同时也是对社会网络与产业网络双重嵌入的过程。基于创业网络中信任关系从情感性信任到认知性信任再到复合信任的演进,新创企业的双重网络嵌入性关系演化呈现出以下规律性:一是由社会网络嵌入向社会网络和产业网络双重嵌入演化;二是由"交易性嵌入"方式向"关系性嵌入"方式演化;三是由双重网络分离式嵌入向叠加式嵌入演化。新创企业双重网络嵌入演化对创业成长有促进作用,但同时也会形成"创业网络经营成本",政府需要对此加以重视。     

基于跨国公司嵌入的开发区产业集聚模式研究

我国国家级开发区的经济是一种独特的集聚经济,即基于跨国公司嵌入的产业集聚经济。本文在对我国开发区的产业集聚进行了深入分析的基础上,提出了基于跨国公司嵌入的三种产业集聚模式。这三种产业集聚模式将块状经济与链状经济有机融合在一起,因而具有较强的竞争优势和强大的生命力,是在经济全球化条件下工业园区发展和我国新型工业化道路的有效路径之一。