On the relationship between supplier integration and time-to-market

Recent operations management and innovation management research emphasizes the importance of supplier integration. However, the empirical results as to the relationship between supplier integration and time-to-market are ambivalent. To understand this important relationship, we incorporate two major recent developments. First, the literature has started to redefine supplier integration into two dimensions, supplier product integration and supplier process integration. Second, recent research has begun to examine spillover effects that extend beyond the direct costs and benefits of the supplier contract. Using survey data of 116 firms in the industrials, health care, and information technology industries, the results confirm our hypotheses and show that supplier product integration decelerates time-to-market while supplier process integration accelerates time-to-market. The results also show a positive relationship between supplier integration and the adoption of external technologies, which either decelerates or accelerates time-to-market depending on the level of internal exploration activities. Our research, thus, helps to open the ‘black-box’ of the relationship between supplier integration and time-to-market, and provides a theoretically grounded explanation to the apparent contradictory results in prior research about the influence of supplier integration on time-to-market. In addition, we contribute to research on spillover effects by emphasizing that information technology adoption and assimilation is an important spillover effect of supplier integration.     

Modelling the impact of the ‘fast track’ land reform policy on Zimbabwe's maize sector

Zimbabwe has recently gone through a widely criticised land reform process that is argued to be the cause of subdued agricultural production. This paper attempts to present a counterfactual picture of the maize market in Zimbabwe had land reform been managed appropriately. The counterfactual is developed through a partial equilibrium framework in order to quantify the impact of the land reform programme. This, to our knowledge, is the first attempt at applying a partial equilibrium framework to an analysis of the impact of land reform. The results of the post-2000 land reform policy simulation showed that actual total maize output was lower than what could have been produced if it was under a pre-2000 land reform system. The study validates the assertion that land reforms contributed to the contraction of output. These results suggest the need for a well planned and executed land reform process, which can still play an important role in output growth and food security.     

Partial Industrialisation in Tourism: A New Model

Certain forms of human activity, such as sport, education and tourism, can be described as being partly industrialised; they are supported partly by organisations with industrial relationships to the particular activity (e.g. tourism industries, sports industries, and so on), and partly by other factors. The latter includes business organisations whose relationship to the activity might be direct and commercial but is non-strategic, non-industrial. Partial industrialisation in tourism (PIIT) has been explored by a handful of researchers interested in its nature, causes and implications. However, the diagrammatic model used in the exploratory studies is awkward, a defect that probably helps explain why PIIT has not become widely recognised in the community of tourism researchers. A new model enables clearer insight and should facilitate understanding and greater recognition. Using the new model, an empirical research project in a mass destination provided substantial evidence for PIIT. Implications arise for many issues, including how tourism is conceptualised, strategic business management, destination competitiveness, destination development and promotion, seasonality, environmental activism, employment numbers, vocational training, planning and government policy.     

油气回收技术浅析

油品蒸发损耗不仅污染环境,影响环境保护,也是能源的极大浪费.作者阐述了几种目前比较成熟的油气回收技术,并通过对各自回收机理的分析比较,指出了他们的优缺点,从而得到各种技术综合应用的经验,为今后的技术开发指出方向.     

OPTIMAL CONSUMPTION AND PORTFOLIO DECISIONS WITH PARTIALLY OBSERVED REAL PRICES

We consider optimal consumption and portfolio investment problems of an investor who is interested in maximizing his utilities from consumption and terminal wealth subject to a random inflation in the consumption basket price over time. We consider two cases: (i) when the investor observes the basket price and (ii) when he receives only noisy observations on the basket price. We derive the optimal policies and show that a modified Mutual Fund Theorem consisting of three funds holds in both cases. The compositions of the funds in the two cases are the same, but in general the investor's allocations of his wealth into these funds will differ. However, in the particular case when the investor has constant relative risk-aversion (CRRA) utility, his optimal investment allocations into these funds are also the same in both cases.     

风机锚杆松弛对基础局压混凝土疲劳损伤的影响分析

为了对特定状态下风机构件疲劳损伤发展进行有效评估,以维持风机平稳运转,通过ABAQUS有限元软件建立起风机基础精细化整体模型,对锚杆松弛发育过程进行模拟,探究了疲劳荷载工况下局压混凝土的应力分布与变化规律,并采用德国劳埃德船级社推荐规范（GL）中混凝土疲劳计算方法对局压混凝土热点开展了疲劳寿命评估。结果表明：1）风机锚杆松弛会影响局压混凝土的应力分布,背风侧混凝土应力集中会更加突出,且应力会随着锚杆松弛加剧而同步增大,因此可将背风侧混凝土的受力情况作为锚杆松弛程度的判断依据;2）综合参考风机结构混凝土疲劳抗压强度设计值和疲劳寿命期望值2项指标评判后显示,锚杆松弛达到8%时,局压混凝土极有可能发生压碎失效,应当及时对松弛锚杆复加预紧力,避免锚杆松弛恶化发展。研究得到的锚杆松弛下风机基础局压混凝土的疲劳损伤规律,可为其在实际工程中的安全运维提供数据支撑。     

Reputation gaps and the performance of service organizations

Links between the reputation of organizations and their financial performance are intuitively attractive to assume, but often difficult to demonstrate convincingly. Gaps between employee and customer perceptions of corporate reputation have traditionally been associated with poor performance. In the context of service business and applying assimilation‐contrast theory, we hypothesize that the nature of such gaps will, in reality, have a differential effect on future revenue depending on the size and valence of the gap. The effects of small gaps should be assimilated by customers, but larger ones have a greater potential of creating a contrast effect resulting in significant increases or decreases in subsequent sales. In businesses where employees have a more positive view of the company reputation than customers, we hypothesize a growth in future sales, and where they have a relatively more negative view, a decline. We test the effects of what we label as reputation gaps in 56 business units drawn from nine service organizations and confirm our hypotheses. Among the implications of our findings are that managing reputation by elevating employee perceptions of a company's reputation above those perceived by its customers holds the potential to enhance future sales. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

我国四部门金融杠杆对系统性金融风险的影响——基于空间溢出视角

基于金融杠杆对系统性金融风险的区域内和区域间作用机制的理论分析,运用空间偏微分方法,依据测算出的2010—2019年我国各省(区、市)四部门金融杠杆和系统性金融风险数据,考量我国四部门金融杠杆对系统性金融风险的空间溢出。结果显示：我国系统性金融风险具有较强的空间趋同性特征;由于金融杠杆部门结构和所在区域的不同,其对系统性金融风险的区域内溢出存在显著差异;此外,金融杠杆对系统性金融风险的区域间外溢效应明显,忽视该区域间溢出,将不利于准确评估金融杠杆对系统性金融风险的冲击。     

A multivariate distance nonlinear causality test based on partial distance correlation: a machine learning application to energy futures

This paper proposes a multivariate distance nonlinear causality test (MDNC) using the partial distance correlation in a time series framework. Partial distance correlation as an extension of the Brownian distance correlation calculates the distance correlation between random vectors X and Y controlling for a random vector Z. Our test can detect nonlinear lagged relationships between time series, and when integrated with machine learning methods it can improve the forecasting power. We apply our method as a feature selection procedure and combine it with the support vector machine and random forests algorithms to study the forecast of the main energy financial time series (oil, coal, and natural gas futures). It shows substantial improvement in forecasting the fuel energy time series in comparison to the classical Granger causality method in time series.     

国际财务报表准则(IFRS)导入方法的多样性——对欧盟,澳大利亚,美国,日本以及中国的考察

IFRS的导入方法存在多样性。但大致可以分为"趋同"和"采用"这两种方法。在110多个已经或即将导入IFRS的国家及地区当中以"采用方法"为主。但同为"采用"也存在完全或部分采用等区别。另一方面,使用"趋同方法"的代表性国家只有美国,日本及中国等国家。但在2009年后,美国及日本前后暗示了导入IFRS方法转变的可能性。因此,对于仍贯彻使用"趋同方法"的中国需要更广泛的关注。