Internet of Things and Big Data as enablers for business digitalization strategies

Digitization blurs the lines between technology and management, facilitating new business models built upon the concepts, methods and tools of the digital environment. The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of the Internet of Things (IoT) and Big Data in terms of how businesses manage their digital transformation. The paper argues that the outbreak of IoT and Big Data has resulted in a mass of disorganized knowledge. In order to make sense of the noise, a literature review was carried out to examine the studies, published in the last decade (2008–2019), that analyzed both the Internet of Things and Big Data. The results show that IoT and Big Data are predominantly reengineering factors for business processes, products and services; however, a lack of widespread knowledge and adoption has led research to evolve into multiple, yet inconsistent paths. The study offers interesting implications for managers and marketers, highlighting how the digital transformation enabled by IoT and Big Data can positively impact many facets of business. By treating IoT and Big Data as faces of the same coin, this study also sheds light on current challenges and opportunities, with the hope of informing future research and practice.     

Trading activities,productivity and markups: Evidence for Spanish manufacturing

This work analyses the firms' internationalisation strategies of importing intermediates and exporting output, and the potential rewards of these activities in terms of total factor productivity (TFP), as a proxy for marginal costs, and markups. It further deepens into the study of the relationship between internationalisation strategies and markups by disentangling whether it operates through affecting firms' marginal costs and/or firms' prices. The panel database employed in this paper is the Spanish Survey on Business Strategies (ESEE) for the period 2006–14. Results in the paper distinguish between SMEs and large firms and indicate that there is high persistence in the performance of these activities and in firms' TFP and markups. For SMEs, we obtain rewards from importing inputs as well as exporting output in terms of TFP and markups. For large firms, we obtain rewards in TFP from the importing activity and rewards in markups from the exporting activity. Finally, we find evidence that the effects of internationalisation strategies on markups are due to both a price channel and a marginal cost channel.     

去工业化、技术差距与产业转移的技术溢出效应

中西部承接产业转移缺乏显著的正向技术溢出效应，成为2000年后区际技术差距持续扩大以及近年部分地区过早去工业化的关键影响因素之一。利用2001~2017年全国30个省（市）面板数据研究证实，各地区技术水平与工业增加值在地区生产总值中的份额之间存在显著正相关性；中西部在2005~2014年承接了较大规模产业转移，而区际技术差距却持续扩大，技术溢出效应显著为负。在相对偏低的技术水平条件下，中西部地区在十余年的产业承接中主要依赖于廉价的要素成本优势，其自主创新能力、创新资源积累已不足以抵御本地消费升级、要素成本上升与国际需求疲软等负面因素的叠加影响。最终，技术差距、商品及服务净输出赤字的扩大至少加快了部分欠发达地区的去工业化。     

How efficient airways act as role models and in what dimensions? A superefficiency DEA model enhanced by social network analysis

In this empirical study, a five-stage methodology is used to examine the efficiency of 45 worldwide known airline companies from the financial, operation and marketing perspectives. Initially, the superefficient data envelopment model is run with inputs and outputs that are selected based on the literature review. However, because 21 out of 45 airline companies are found to be efficient based on this analysis, a stepwise regression-based mechanism is applied to four reduced models – one for each output variable – for better discrimination. The outputs are, namely, net profit margin (financial output), passengers carried, on-time departure performance (operational outputs), and customer satisfaction (marketing output). In this way, the significant input variables are found for each reduced model. In the third stage, in order to provide even more discrimination, social network-based eigenvector centrality values are used as the weights of the superefficiency scores, and the strengths and weaknesses of efficient airlines for each output are specified in terms of their related significant inputs. The results show that, when net profit margin is taken as an output, Vietnam Airlines has the top weighted superefficiency value and excels in terms of available seat kilometers and liquidity, but it should improve its debt level. Although Norwegian Airlines has the highest efficiency with respect to debt level, it is not the best role model because its eigenvector centrality value is relatively low. However, Norwegian airlines also has the highest weighted superefficiency and acts as a role model in terms of on-time departures with respect to this output. Its main strength is liquidity, and it has no significant weaknesses. On the other hand, in terms of overall satisfaction and passengers carried, Vietnam Airlines and Thai Airways are the leaders, respectively. Vietnam Airlines is the only superefficient company with respect to overall satisfaction, while the basic strengths of Thai Airways in terms of passengers carried are its employee and fleet, and it has no significant weakness. A final aggregation of the results is made by making pairwise comparisons of the relative importance of four outputs for 7 experts selected from different departments of airline companies. According to the results, Net Profit Margin has the highest priority, followed by On-time Departure and Overall Customer Satisfaction, while passengers carried has the lowest importance. Based on these relative priorities, it can be said that Vietnam Airlines can be accepted as the top performing airline company, followed by Norwegian Airlines.     

Venture capital,innovation, and growth: evidence from Chinese metropolitan data

Using panel data from 282 Chinese cities from 2003 to 2015, we estimate the impact of venture capital (VC) on innovation, employment, and payroll in metropolitan areas. Controlling for endogeneity, VC investments are significantly positively related to metropolitan innovation, employment, and payroll in a fixed effects panel regression and dynamic GMM estimation. Using the number of IPOs (Initial public offerings) in the city as an instrumental variable to again control for endogeneity, VC remains significant. Our results show that VC is significantly contributing to the metropolitan economy as a whole by supporting innovation, creating jobs, and generating wealth in the local cities.     

大数据对法院司法统计的积极功效及边界

最高人民法院于2016年应用人民法院大数据管理和服务平台以后,全国法院司法统计完全实现计算机自动采集。从发展脉络来看法院司法统计正处于智能化转型阶段,仍然存在一些问题。随着大数据及新技术的引入,司法统计“大数据”得以成为现实,包括了数据采集的全面化、统计分析的综合化、统计平台的社会化,进而提出了大数据助力司法统计精准化的具体路径,包括了提高基础数据的量与质、加强对司法统计数据的深度分析和可视化分析、推进基础设施建设。然而,二者并不具有正相关性。因此,推进司法统计大数据化需要注意有两个限度。     

The long-run reversal in the long run: Insights from two centuries of international equity returns

We perform the most comprehensive test of long-term reversal in national equity indices ever done. Having examined data from 71 countries for the years 1830 through 2019, we demonstrate a strong reversal pattern: the past long-term return negatively predicts future performance. The phenomenon is not subsumed by other established cross-sectional return patterns, including the value effect. The long-term reversal is robust to many considerations but highly unstable through time. Finally, our findings support the overreaction explanation of this anomaly.     

The effects of mega-events on perceived corruption

In recent decades, the media have covered many cases of corruption related to the celebration of mega-events around the globe. In most of these cases, politicians and other high officials are involved. This paper analyses the effect of hosting mega-events on the level of perceived corruption in 34 OECD countries, during 1996–2017. Summer and Winter Olympic Games, FIFA World Cups, and Universal Expositions are considered. Results show that, when we take the year of the celebration of the event as the turning point, there is no robust evidence in favour of a positive impact on perceived corruption. However, when we take the election date of the host country as the threshold, the magnitude of the effect is lasting, reaching its maximum value 1–2 years before the celebration itself, and increasing the perceived level of corruption by about 4%.     

Consumption,asset wealth,equity premium,term spread,and flight to quality

We link transitory deviations of consumption from its equilibrium relationship with aggregate wealth and labor income to equity returns on the one hand, and to two characteristics of bond investors—the premium demanded to hold long‐term assets, and “flight to quality” behavior—on the other hand. Using a panel of 10 euro area countries over the period 1984Q1–2017Q4, we show that a rise in the consumption–wealth ratio predicts both higher equity returns and the future term spread, while a fall in the consumption–wealth ratio explains a large fraction of the rise in the spread between the “risky” and the “safe‐haven” bond.     

Life Course Perspective on Economic Shocks and Income Inequality Through Age-Period-Cohort Analysis: Evidence From Finland

Utilizing age-period-cohort analysis, this paper examines the development of income distribution across periodic economic fluctuations in relation to cohorts and age groups. The empirical analysis is based on the Finnish Income Distribution Statistics and Household Expenditure Surveys covering the period of 1966–2015. The findings suggest that the period and cohort effects can be identified as the main effects on relative income, while the age effects have no meaningful impact when the control variables are taken into account. This result reveals a connection between the effects of economic shocks and cohort placement on labor market entry. Additionally, absolute income analysis suggests that economic shocks create stagnation points in income development, which are especially detrimental to cohorts who are transitioning into labor markets. Additionally, middle-income attainment has not changed due to periodic shocks but rather is related to inter-cohort inequalities and relative income differences, where the baby boomer generation is a clear winner.