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The explosion generated by the global financial crisis in 2008 and its transmission to the real economies have been interpreted as calling for new kinds of regulation of the banking and the financial systems that would have allowed re-establishing a virtuous relation between the real and the financial sectors of the economy. In this paper we maintain a different view, that the financial crisis and the ensuing real crisis have roots in the strong increase in income inequality that has been taking place in the Western world in the last thirty years or so. This has created an all around aggregate demand deficiency crisis that has strongly reduced prospects and opportunities for investments in productive capacities and shifted resources toward other uses, thus feeding a perverse relation between the productive and the non-productive assets of the economy. In this context the way out of the crisis is re-establishing the right distributive conditions, which cannot be obtained by a policy aimed at relieving the weight of private or public debts but calls for a redistribution through taxes on the incomes of non-productive sectors, a fine tuning that should prevent excessive taxations transforming positive into negative effects.

This chapter outlines the development of a PMS (Performance Measurement System) to support the management and evaluation of public networks from the perspective of the individual actors operating within the network and the managers with responsibilities over the activity of the entire network. The study concerns two systems, the first, called “PMS accounting for network effects”, evaluates the network from the angle of individual organizations in charge of operations within the network and is, therefore, intended as a support for management within the network. The second system, called “PMS accounting for the network as an entity”, evaluates the networks from the viewpoint of the network manager in charge of the whole network; this system is meant to support the management of the network itself. Both the systems are based on the multi-layered concept of a public network and make use of individual components that constitute a PMS.

Manufacturing companies that adopt the servitization strategy usually show lack of knowledge regarding the service offering associated to their manufactured products. Acquiring external knowledge from service suppliers can be a way to tackle this problem. The objective of this study is to understand how manufacturing companies aiming at a servitization-driven business model innovation (BMI) integrate such knowledge from service suppliers. We focus on different types of collaboration that can occur and on the knowledge sharing (KS) dynamics of this collaboration. We employ a multiple-case study approach to analyze nine BMI processes from companies that transformed their traditional business model (BM) to a servitized BM. As a result, we obtain a theoretical framework that presents six possible KS dynamics for the servitization design by originally combining two main approaches for servitization-driven BMI (i.e. product-oriented and service-oriented product-service systems) and three main configurations of relationships with service suppliers based on traditional new product development classifications of buyer-supplier integration (i.e. white, grey and black box configurations). Implications of combining a BMI and a buyer-supplier KS perspectives to investigate the process of servitization for manufacturing companies are then discussed.

Hybrid organisations exhibit high degree of innovativeness, but also instability due to the conflicting institutional logics underpinning their activities. We enrich the discussion on how to reconcile conflicting logics in hybrid organisations using the analogy with music theory. In particular, we get inspiration from a technique used to modulate conflicting harmonies by means of the notes they have in common (common-notes) to derive ideas on how to compose conflicting logics by means of the practices they have in common. We illustrate these ideas in the specific case of social enterprises, showing that practices able to ‘unblock’ a marginalised individual’s value creation capabilities can be considered common-note practices allowing the social enterprise to fruitfully and sustainably combine commercial and social welfare logics.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to identify the main determinants of winegrowers’ profitability in Eastern Europe with the ultimate purpose to improve the wine industry competitiveness. Design/methodology/approach The research is focussed on the Moldova region (Romania), a little studied wine-growing area that presents potential for the future development of the wine industry. A hierarchical approach is applied to consider the simultaneous effects of climate aspects, vineyard features, winegrowers’ characteristics and management practices on vineyards’ profitability. The model is based on data from 274 vineyards managed by 64 winegrowers, where 32 different grape varieties are cultivated in different districts. Different scenarios are simulated and alternative policies are analysed. Findings Climate aspects and human factors, particularly the educational level and type of agriculture practiced, emerge as main determinants. Farmers’ climate change perceptions also have a primary role. The grape variety affects profitability differences across vineyards at a lower extent. Research limitations/implications The study suggests an approach easily replicable to other viticultural contexts. Practical implications Results are useful for policymakers in order to forecast the impact of policies devoted to improving the wine industry competitiveness in Eastern Europe. Originality/value The study presents a micro-scale analysis in which the effects of climate aspects, vineyard features, winegrowers’ characteristics and management practices are simultaneously estimated. It also produces new knowledge in a little studied wine region.

Purpose Considering that SMEs are widely recognized as important innovators and, in the past years, have registered increasing levels of patenting, the purpose of this paper is to unveil the impact of both internal and external knowledge sourcing on SME patenting performance and test the moderating role of formal plan for innovation and absorptive capacity. Design/methodology/approach The authors propose an econometric approach based on a Hurdle Count Data Model which allows the authors not only to overcome problems related to the count dependent variables often assuming zero values, but also to separate patent propensity from patent portfolio size. Findings This methodology puts in evidence that an internal factor (i.e. employee skills for innovation) significantly influences SME patent propensity, while an external factor (i.e. open innovation with business partners) impacts SME portfolio size. Moreover, both formal plan for innovation and absorptive capacity play an important moderating role. Originality/value This paper embraces a knowledge perspective to investigate the determinants of SME patenting, which contributes to the knowledge-based view of the firm in the SME domain. Moreover, differently from most studies in the area of patenting which adopt a macro-level perspective and rely on secondary data, it assumes a firm-level approach and bases on primary data, which contributes to make it particularly distinctive.

Taking the role of a facilitator, the EU has published recommendations to steer sustainability policies in local governments. The authors analysed strategic plans published by Italian local governments and found that the EU recommendations had zero effect. The way forward is for local governments to be required to produce sustainability policies.

Big data and the Internet of things are two parallel universes, but they are so close that in most cases they blend together. The amount of devices that connect to the internet grows day by day and they bring millions of data. The IoT generates unprecedented amounts of data and this impacts on the entire big data universe. The IoT and big data are clearly growing apace, and are set to transform many areas of business and everyday life. Semantic technologies play a fundamental role in reducing incompatibilities among data formats and providing an additional layer on which applications can be built, to reason over data and extract new meaningful information. In this chapter we report the most common approaches adopted in dealing with Big Data and IoT problems and explore some of the semantic based solutions which address such problematics.

In this paper, we unveil a disregarded benefit of product market competition for firms. We introduce the probability of bankruptcy in a simple model where firms compete a la Cournot and apply for collateralized bank loans to undertake productive investments. We show that the number of competitors and the existence of outsiders willing to acquire the productive assets of distressed incumbents affect the equilibrium share of investment financed by bank credit. Using a sample of Italian manufacturing firms, mostly small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), we found evidence showing that the degree of product market competition is positively correlated with the share of investment financed by bank credit only when outsiders are absent.

An evolutionary oligopoly game, where firms can select between the best-reply rule and the Walrasian rule, is considered. The industry is characterized by a finite number of ex-ante homogeneous firms that, characterized by naive expectations, decide next-period output by employing one of the two behavioral rules. The inverse demand function is linear and all firms have the same quadratic and convex cost function (decreasing return to scale). Based upon realized profits, the distribution of behavioral rules is updated according to a replicator dynamics. The model is characterized by two equilibria: the Cournot-Nash equilibrium, where all firms adopt the best-reply rule and produce the Cournot-Nash quantity, and the Walrasian equilibrium, where all firms adopt the Walrasian rule and produce the Walrasian quantity. The analysis reveals that the Walrasian equilibrium is globally stable as long as the rate of change of marginal cost exceeds the sum of residual market price sensitivities to output. If not, the Walrasian equilibrium loses stability and an attractor, representing complicated dynamics with evolutionary stable heterogeneity, arises through a bifurcation. As the propensity of firms to select the more profitable behavioral rule increases, the attractor disappears through a global bifurcation and the Cournot-Nash equilibrium can become a global Milnor attractor. To sum up, the best-reply rule can be evolutionary dominant over the Walrasian rule and this can lead an oligopoly to select the Cournot-Nash equilibrium.

In this paper we explore the impact of the banking sector development on the first time export entry of small enterprises (SEs) in the Turkish manufacturing sector. By exploiting variation in the number of branches per capita across NUTS3 regions and variation in financial dependence across sectors, we support a positive and significant role of finance in fostering the access to foreign markets of SEs. This evidence is robust to the use of alternative measures, the control for omitted variables and the correction for endogeneity. We show that the banking sector reduces the incidence of sunk entry costs by providing both credit and destination-specific information. Finally, we provide original evidence on the role of the territorial diffusion of foreign banks’ branches on SEs’ exports. While no direct effect is detected, we disclose a minor and indirect effect of foreign branches working through their influence on the banking sector development at the local level.

We propose a financial market model with optimistic and pessimistic fundamentalists who, respectively, overestimate and underestimate the true fundamental value due to ambiguity in the stock market. We assume that agents form their beliefs about the fundamental value through an imitative process, considering the relative ability shown by optimists and pessimists in guessing the realized stock price. We also introduce an endogenous switching mechanism, allowing agents to switch to the other group of speculators if they performed better in terms of relative profits. Moreover, the stock price is determined by a nonlinear mechanism. We study, via analytical and numerical tools, the stability of the unique steady state, its bifurcations and the emergence of complex behaviors, with possible multistability phenomena. To quantify the global propensity to optimism/pessimism of the market, we introduce an index, depending on pessimists’ and optimists’ beliefs and shares, thanks to which we are able to show that the occurrence of the waves of optimism and pessimism are due to the joint effect of imitation and switching mechanism. Finally, we perform a statistical analysis of a stochastically perturbed version of the model, which high lights fat tails and excess volatility in the returns distributions, as well as bubbles and crashes for stock prices, in agreement with the empirical literature.

Nowadays societies face many societal challenges, among which increasing inequality and marginalisation. This paper uses this key to read the discussion undertaken during the DRUID Conference 2015 ‘Relevance of Innovation’, held at LUISS Business School (Rome, IT). We focus on the speeches, sessions, and debates that were hosted at the conference. We expand them and build on them to advance scholarly discussion on how social innovation, social entrepreneurship and business model innovation can be used to face inequality and marginalisation. The main idea we place at the centre of the discussion is empowerment of marginalised individuals by social innovation initiatives and social entrepreneurial ventures. Business model innovation is seen as instrumental to this, being a crucial tool to foster hybrid organisations and institutions able to merge the social and economic dimensions.

In the fall of 2015, a call for papers was issued on ‘The relevance of Innovation for Ethics, Responsibility and Sustainability’, as a follow up of the rich and interesting debates, which took place at LUISS during the 2015 DRUID Summer Conference on this topic. A few conference participants were invited to submit their papers for publication in this special issue, but also external contributors were invited through the open call. This special issue thus presents the most interesting contributions on innovation seen from a social perspective, together with key outcomes from the conference itself.

The shortage of studies on spatial spillovers of capital subsidy policies is rather surprising, considering that such policies are usually designed to generate spatial externalities. We propose a new framework that allows positive agglomeration effects to be contrasted with the negative cross-sectional substitution and the crowding-out effect. The global evaluation of the ATT and the spillover parameters shifts the spotlight from the policy effect on subsidised firms to the global effect of capital subsidy policies on the targeted territory. The empirical evaluation of a policy in Italy mainly directed towards small- and medium-sized firms shows that the impact on investments, turnover and employment is positive and large, but is negative on TFP. However, the employment growth is partially determined to the detriment of the untreated firms.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to propose a relatively simple and rapid method to create a digital human model (DHM) to serve clothing industry. Design/methodology/approach Human body’s point cloud is divided into hands, foots, head and torso. Then forward modeling method is used to model hands and foots, photo modeling method is used to model head and reverse modeling method is used to model torso. After that, hands, foots, head and torso are integrated together to get a static avatar. Next, virtual skeleton is bound to the avatar. Finally, a lifelike digital human body model is created by the mixed modeling method (MMM). Findings In allusion to the defect of the three-dimension original data of human body, this paper presented an MMM, with which we can get a realistic digital human body model with accurate body dimensions. The DHM can well meet the needs of fashion industry. Practical implications The DHM, which is got by the MMM, can be well applied in the field of virtual try on, virtual fashion design, virtual fashion show and so on. Originality/value The originality of the paper lies in the integration of forward modeling, reverse modeling and photo modeling to present a novel method of human body modeling.

Our chapter explores the US Food and Drug Administration’s (USFDA’s) regulation of medical foods, a growing industry that lies between pharmaceutical drugs and food. In addition to an overall discussion of the short regulatory history of medical foods, we cover the agency’s recently released revised draft guidance and other regulatory requirements for medical foods, including the applicable Current Good Manufacturing Practices and import/export requirements, as well as FDA’s enforcement actions to date.

We present a dynamic model of firm absorptive capacity, which is consistent with a process-oriented conceptualization and based on the teaching-learning approach, to investigate the effect of social interactions among the firm members on the firm absorptive capacity. In particular, two main learning processes are considered: the explorative and the transformative learning. To develop the model, the Ising approach, which is a very well established framework to study the dynamics of social interactions, is employed. Furthermore, a simulation analysis is carried out to investigate the effect of two patterns and four levels of social interactions on the firm absorptive capacity. Results show that block-diagonal patterns, where interactions occur inside groups and not between groups (such as in modular organizations), lead to higher absorptive capacity, compared to hierarchical patterns (e.g., those exhibited by centralized organizations). We also show that the relationship between the level of social interactions and the firm absorptive capacity follows an inverted-U shape in the block-diagonal patterns, while the absorptive capacity decreases as the level of interactions rises, in the hierarchical patterns. Finally, we find that the social network also plays a moderating role on the relationship between the complementary knowledge and the firm absorptive capacity.

The relation between rent sharing and wages has generally been evaluated on average wages. This article uses a unique employer–employee panel database to investigate the extent of rent sharing along the wage distribution in Italy. We apply quantile regression techniques and control for national level bargaining, unobserved worker and firm heterogeneity and endogeneity. Our findings show that the extent of rent sharing decreases along the wage distribution, suggesting that unskilled workers benefit most from firms’ rents. By applying quantile regressions by occupational categories, we show that the decreasing pattern is mainly driven by blue collar workers, while estimates for white collars are higher and basically constant along the wage distribution. We also provide evidence that unions might represent one of the drivers of our findings.

This article tackles the issue of local and global dynamics in a nonlinear duopoly with quantity setting (managerial) firms and horizontal product differentiation. It studies how the dynamics of a two-dimensional discrete time map evolves by focusing on changes either in the degree of product differentiation or the managerial power in the market share bonus. By combining mathematical techniques and numerical experiments, it shows that the Nash equilibrium of the game may not describe the long-term outcomes of the market. This holds because the fixed point of the map may be unstable or because different attractors (simple or chaotic) may capture the long-term dynamics of the model. The article also analyzes market dynamics when a new potential entrant tries to enter or, alternatively, a firm that was already in the market closes down and then tries to re-enter in a context where there is already an incumbent with a strictly positive quantity. The potential entrant may be subject to entry barriers or enters the market depending on the structure of consumers’ preferences and the demands of products of both varieties. In particular, the article analyzes some economic consequences of the non-invertibility of the map in the entry process.

An important challenge that firms should be able to tackle regards the mitigation of the environmental impact of their production processes avoiding additional costs. Using industrial symbiosis (IS), two different firms can obtain mutual environmental and economic benefits, at the same time, exchanging wastes for primary inputs. Industrial symbiosis networks (ISNs), i.e. networks of production processes exchanging wastes among them, are thus emerging and efficiency measures are needed to be defined and investigated, in order to drive the ISN design and development. In this paper, we develop the concept of technical exchange efficiency of ISNs and develop a measure of such an efficiency. This measure is computed by using an input-output approach at the enterprise level, modelling symbiotic flows within ISNs. A case example is discussed in order to show the practical applications of technical exchange efficiency of ISNs. In particular, technical exchange efficiency of ISNs can be useful in order to drive the development of existing ISNs and to design new industrial systems exploiting the IS approach.

This article summarizes the papers published in the special issue entitled “Closed Loop Supply Chain (CLSC): Economics, Modelling, Management and Control” in the International Journal of Production Economics. A total of 24 papers, covering an extensive range of topics in the Closed Loop Supply Chain research area, have been included in this special issue. This special issue received a wide and diverse geographical contribution with authors from 16 countries located in 4 continents including America, Asia, Europe, and Africa. Initially, the special issue received 71 research paper submissions and the final selection of 24 papers, which were recommended by at least two reviewers, provide a basis for new research directions in the domain of reverse logistics and Closed Loop Supply Chain management.

In the oligopoly literature, the introduction of modified cost functions has added reality into the classical analysis. In particular, some recent contributions analyzed oligopoly dynamics when considering production adjustment costs. Although this is a step in building more realistic models, adjustment costs may be different depending on the adjustment direction. In fact, when quantity decreases, firms may decide to lay off workers; by contrast, when quantity increases, new workers need to be hired and this entails searching and selection costs. In this paper, dynamic single-product oligopolies without product differentiation are first examined and then we study how this dynamic is affected by the additional adjustment costs. The resulting dynamic is complex and the consequences of this complexity are examined in terms of policy making.

Even though the financial literature has examined the relation between the composition of the board of directors and firms’ performances, few studies have investigated the effect of adopting a specific corporate governance system. Past studies have not found clear evidence of the superiority of a specific corporate governance system in terms of economic and financial performances; instead, they have generally been limited to legal systems where the adoption of a specific system is mandatory. In this paper, we take into consideration the case of the Italian Corporate Law Reform, which gives firms the opportunity to choose, in a non-mandatory way, between different governance systems and in particular between a one-tier model and the pre-existing system prior to the Reform. Using propensity score matching and focusing on a sample of unlisted Italian joint-stock companies, we found evidence of a significant worsening of performances from 2003 to 2013 for corporations adopting a one-tier board after the Reform.

Purpose The decisions taken today relating to urban renewal interventions are rarely supported by logical and operational methodologies capable of effectively rationalising selection processes. For this purpose, it is necessary to propose and implement analysis models with the aim of promoting the sustainable development of the territory. The purpose of this paper is to define a model for the optimal allocation of scarce resources. Design/methodology/approach The Discrete Linear Programming (DLP) is used for selecting investments aimed at achieving financial, social, cultural and environmental sustainability. Findings The proposed model lends itself to the construction of investment plans on behalf of both types of decision makers, of both a public and a private nature. Research limitations/implications All projects are evaluated according to multi-criteria logics, so that it is possible to find compromise solutions, in accordance with the stakeholders’ different preferences. Practical implications The model, written with A Mathematical Programming Language using DLP logics, is tested – case study – so as to define an investment programme finalised for urban renewal of a vast area. Social implications The proposed econometric model makes it possible to obtain the optimal combination of projects for urban renewal with a view to achieving the sustainable development of the territory. Originality/value Using the proposed model, all projects are evaluated according to multi-criteria logics, so that it is possible to find compromise solutions, in accordance with the stakeholders’ different preferences.

Magnitude estimation is a psychophysical scaling technique for the measurement of sensation, where observers assign numbers to stimuli in response to their perceived intensity. We investigate the use of magnitude estimation for judging the relevance of documents for information retrieval evaluation, carrying out a large-scale user study across 18 TREC topics and collecting over 50,000 magnitude estimation judgments using crowdsourcing. Our analysis shows that magnitude estimation judgments can be reliably collected using crowdsourcing, are competitive in terms of assessor cost, and are, on average, rank-aligned with ordinal judgments made by expert relevance assessors. We explore the application of magnitude estimation for IR evaluation, calibrating two gain-based effectiveness metrics, nDCG and ERR, directly from user-reported perceptions of relevance. A comparison of TREC system effectiveness rankings based on binary, ordinal, and magnitude estimation relevance shows substantial variation; in particular, the top systems ranked using magnitude estimation and ordinal judgments differ substantially. Analysis of the magnitude estimation scores shows that this effect is due in part to varying perceptions of relevance: different users have different perceptions of the impact of relative differences in document relevance. These results have direct implications for IR evaluation, suggesting that current assumptions about a single view of relevance being sufficient to represent a population of users are unlikely to hold.

Starting from the increasing difficulties for firms to create new value for customers and consequently to achieve competitive advantage, the present paper proposes an alternative strategic approach based on the notion of tradition. Specifically, tradition is defined as the whole set of competencies, knowledge, values, and culture that characterize a specific firm, territory, and/or age. Analyzing three successful Italian companies (Barilla Group, Brunello Cucinelli Group, Aboca), the paper clearly shows how tradition may be effectively employed to face competition, allowing companies both to create and to appropriate value.

Firms' innovation portfolios include several dimensions ranging from organizational aspects to cost reduction and product characteristics. All of these efforts take place during the product life cycle, and interact with each other in determining the spectrum of features of the product and its performance on the market. This paper contributes to the related theoretical debate, focussing on the possibility of having superior product quality levels at lower marginal production cost over time. To deal with this issue, we investigate the optimal R&D portfolio of a single-product monopolist investing in cost-reducing activities accompanied by efforts improving the quality of its product over an infinite time horizon. It turns out that the firm's relative incentives along the two directions are conditional upon market affluence, measured by consumers' willingness to pay for quality, and R&D efforts are complements in the neighbourhood of the steady state equilibrium. However, the dynamics of the two R&D controls depend on both quality and marginal cost at every instant. Consequently, as the stability analysis reveals, the steady state equilibrium is indeed unstable due to the dynamics of marginal cost, thereby implying that one should not expect the firm to supply an increasing quality level at a decreasing production cost. Hence, the dynamic interplay between R&D controls and the resulting instability affecting production costs also imply that one may not expect to observe product quality to increase and market price to decrease over the product life cycle.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate intellectual capital (IC) discussions held between investors using Web 2.0 tools. More precisely, this paper investigates the determinants of IC disclosures (ICDs) on internet stock message boards (IMBs). Design/methodology/approach Four hypotheses were developed and tested through content analysis of 60,996 messages posted on two main IMBs, Yahoo!Finance and TheLion.com, followed by descriptive statistics and logistic regression testing. Findings The findings show that Web 2.0 is bringing new opportunities to disclose IC. Traditional theories, such as agency, stakeholder, signalling, and legitimacy theory, cannot be applied to the Web 2.0 context. Therefore, a new approach that focusses more on the personal motivations for disclosing IC is called for. At a glance, the results show that IC is disclosed on IMBs, and several elements influence both the quantity and quality of those disclosures. Sometimes “trolls” disturb the dialogue and discourage participation by other investors. Conversely, online influencers facilitate ICD. To filter messages, the time of posting, the length of the messages, and the sentiment the messages contain should be considered along with the author of the message. Originality/value This paper contributes to the existing literature by investigating the IC disclosed on IMBs. The findings provide insights about how ICDs are developed using Web 2.0 tools.

In the aftermath of the international financial crisis, the European Union (EU) adopted a series of regulatory reforms concerning capital adequacy, bank structures and resolution in order to tackle the risks created by financial institutions that were ‘too big to fail’. This article demonstrates different degrees of progress towards a supranational framework in two important areas of reform: Limited harmonization of the rules on bank structures, but robust progress toward the supranationalization of bank resolution, where the euro area dimension is also considered. What accounts for this variation? We draw on a synthesis of neofunctionalism and liberal intergovernmentalism to explain the diverging outcomes. We explain the low supranationalization in bank structural reforms with the absence of strong spillovers and availability of domestic options to unilaterally contain financial instability. In bank resolution, we examine the causal mechanisms through which significant spillovers modified the government preferences of key Member States.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between ownership concentration and human capital (HC) disclosure released via LinkedIn.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses a quantitative methodology. The sample is composed of 150 European companies. Content analysis was used to examine HC disclosure via LinkedIn. Regression analysis was used to test the hypothesis.FindingsThe results indicate that ownership concentration negatively influences HC disclosure via LinkedIn, confirming that closely held firms have little motivation to voluntarily release information.Research limitations/implicationsThe main limitation of this study relates to the sample size. Furthermore, this study investigates only the quantity of HC disclosure; it does not consider the quality of this information.Practical implicationsThe typical ownership structure of European firms generates a force that opposes the growing pressure for internationalization and global transparency. This important issue needs to be considered in investor decisions, HC management and reporting and in setting accounting standards. Moreover, the study points out that, despite the potential opportunities provided by LinkedIn to build and enforce relationships with their stakeholders, companies mainly use LinkedIn for recruitment purposes.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the literature on HC disclosure because it is, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, the first study that exclusively examines HC disclosure by European companies via LinkedIn and because it develops a disclosure index that includes items concerning the stock of knowledge and capabilities of employees in addition to the practices in human resource management.

This chapter summarizes the physical properties of THz antennas, provides a summary of some of the most important recent developments in the field of energy harvesting of Earth long-wave infrared radiation, discusses the potential applications and identifies the future challenges and opportunities. In particular, a THz antenna is designed in order to transform the thermal energy, provided by the Sun and re-emitted from the Earth, in electricity. The proposed antenna is a square spiral of gold printed on a low cost dielectric substrate. Simulations have been conducted in order to investigate the behavior of the antenna illuminated by a circularly polarized plane wave with an amplitude chosen according to the Stefan-Boltzmann radiation law. Moreover, these THz antennas could be coupled with other components to obtain direct rectification of T radiation. As a consequence, these structures further optimized could be a promising alternative to the conventional photovoltaic solar cells.

We examine how product market threats influence the precision of analyst forecasts. Greater competitive threats may make forecasting more difficult by increasing the uncertainty regarding future cash flows and by influencing the quality of financial disclosure. Using a firm-specific measure of product market threats (i.e., fluidity), we find that analysts are more likely to be less precise forecasting earnings for highly fluid firms and that the lack of precision is not fully explained by performance volatility. Our findings further suggest that firms with fluid products have lower accruals quality and that they are more likely to withheld information regarding contract terms and sales from major customers. Cross-sectional analysis further suggests that the effect of fluidity on analyst forecasts is more pronounced when firms have flexibility in disclosure choices. Using significant changes in tariff rates as a quasi-natural experiment, we find that analyst forecast precision is significantly lower following tariff reductions.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of different learning sources in the process of capability building of Chinese firms (CFs) approaching international markets. Design/methodology/approach The paper is based on the case study of the company “Goodbaby.” The primary data sources are two semi-structured interviews with one of the firm’s managers, which have been triangulated with point of sale visits, interviews with industry experts, and secondary data such as corporate records, patent and trademark data, industry reports and news articles. Findings Both the home-country and foreign markets act as sources of learning to support the development of CFs’ marketing capabilities. Learning at home is triggered by the complexity of the national market and the exposure to foreign entrants. Foreign learning is stimulated by the relationships with leading foreign partners and the exposure to advanced final markets. Moreover, each learning source has a positive effect on the development of CFs’ marketing capabilities in both market contexts in which they compete, i.e. the home-market and international markets. Practical implications CFs’ managers should be simultaneously receptive to the domestic and foreign contexts, as both may support the development of marketing capabilities. CFs’ managers should recognize the learning opportunities embedded in each of these contexts, and identify the markets where these can be effectively redeployed. Originality/value The authors distinguish between different sources of learning in the context of CFs’ internationalization, and explore their triggering factors and their role in the development of an underinvestigated type of capabilities, i.e. the marketing capabilities.

PurposeThis paper aims to investigate the process performances in Emergency Departments (EDs) with a novel data-driven approach, permitting to discover the entire patient-flow, deploy the performances in term of time and resources on the activities and flows and identify process deviations and critical bottlenecks. Moreover, the use of this methodology in real time might dynamically provide a picture of the current situation inside the ED in term of waiting times, crowding, resources, etc., supporting the management of patient demand and resources in real time.Design/methodology/approachThe proposed methodology exploits the process-mining techniques. Starting from the event data inside the hospital information systems, it permits automatically to extract the patient-flows, to evaluate the process performances, to detect process exceptions and to identify the deviations between the expected and the actual results.FindingsThe application of the proposed method to a real ED revealed being valuable to discover the actual patient-flow, measure the performances of each activity with respect to the predefined targets and compare different operating situations.Practical implicationsStarting from the results provided by this system, hospital managers may explore the root causes of deviations, identify areas for improvements and hypothesize improvement actions. Finally, process-mining outputs may provide useful information for creating simulation models to test and compare alternative ED operational scenarios.Originality/valueThis study responds to the need of novel approaches for monitoring and evaluating processes performances in the EDs. The novelty of this data-driven approach is the opportunity to timely connect performances, patient-flows and activities.

This chapter analyses the dynamics of life insurance and bancassurance within the new Solvency 2 regime. After having assessed the general trends of life insurance market in Europe during Solvency 1, this chapter investigates the challenges and the perspectives of the new regulatory framework, with a focus on both the supply and the demand side. We assess in particular the issue of very low interest rates and their potential impact on insurance companies’ business under the new regime. Finally, given our management perspective, we will discuss the potential implications and we will provide some guidelines for European insurance companies.

Recently more and more companies are adopting proactive sustainable strategies and developing sustainable supply chain management practices. Researchers identify Closed-Loop Supply Chain (CLSC) models as one of the major contributors to realising sustainable operations. Such models typically use flows concerning the products only as the unit of analysis. This paper intends to provide a basis for developing new CLSC models, extending them to recovery resources from general outputs (e.g. unavoidable waste) with no value in terms of products. The new models affect also the configuration of the CLSC, with different set of resource suppliers and logistics providers. The case study analysed in this paper derives from the food sector, in which the waste produced is reused as a resource, avoiding the disposal of different materials through resource-recovery activities that allow waste to be returned to the main supply chain as valuable inputs to configure a new supply chain. The principal objective of this study is to create a new sustainable model of CLSC using and recovering waste from meat processing. A profitability indicator, an energy self-sufficiency one and a qualitative assessment of social implications are introduced to evaluate global sustainability opportunities for activating new loops.

Banks and venture capitalists enable the financing of entrepreneurial firms and thereby promote regional development. The effectiveness of these two very different financing arrangements depends on the manner in which they are delivered, and the institutional conditions of the regions in which they operate. This editorial introduces the issues surrounding these topics, overviews selected papers in the entrepreneurial finance literature, and summarizes the special issue papers and their contributions to the literature. We further provide avenues for relevant and fruitful further research.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the trends and features of one of the most visible intellectual property (IP) management practices, IP licensing, in the context of start-ups, accessing external technology at the outset of their lifetime. In particular, it compares start-ups and incumbent firms, in terms of licensing strategy pursued, role of in-licensed technologies relative to the internal innovation process and successively implemented IP management strategies. Design/methodology/approach A mixed-method study is presented using quantitative data on licensing deals from the US Securities and Exchange Commission and cases on start-up companies involved in inbound technology licensing. Findings Evidence indicates start-ups have different IP licensing strategies than incumbents, and their successive IP management strategies are more flexible than for incumbents. Originality/value The authors shed light on IP licensing, which is gaining momentum in open innovation (OI) settings, in an understudied segment of SMEs, namely, start-ups. The authors display interesting evidence of the portion of start-ups that license-in from external companies, indicating that this practice is more widespread than literature would suggest; the authors demonstrate that licensing-in is a valuable strategy for start-up companies, possibly providing additional channels for acquiring know-how on the market. The authors therefore contribute to, and advance, entrepreneurship, IP and OI literature.

Customer segmentation is one of the most important purposes of customer base analysis for telecommunication companies. Because companies accumulate very large amounts of data on customer behavior, segmentation is typically achieved by profiling and clustering traffic behavior jointly with demographic data and contracts characteristics. Unfortunately, most algorithms and models used for segmentation do not take into account the longitudinal characteristics of data. In particular, in telecommunication traffic analysis, the importance of decreasing patterns of traffic in customers' lives is well known, and it is relevant to aggregate all clients with such a pattern, while other unknown clusters may be of interest for the marketing manager. Our approach to address this problem is based on specifying the distribution of functions as a mixture of a parametric hierarchical model describing the decreasing pattern segment and a nonparametric contamination that allows unanticipated curve shapes in subjects' traffic. The parametric component is chosen based on prior knowledge, while the contamination is characterized as a functional Dirichlet process. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

TTOs have been considered the most important instrument for universities to support and develop academic entrepreneurship. Various policies and instruments can be implemented by TTOs to support the commercialization of academic knowledge. We focus on factors such as TTOs' governance and their internal organization, the mission/ strategy underlying their activities, and the national and specific constrains under which they work to better understand the role of TTOs and the role of universities as facilitators (or inhibitors) of academic entrepreneurship. Using the data from a survey developed under the FinKT (Financing Knowledge Transfer in Europe) project, we provide evidence on the support that academic, European TTOs offer to academic entrepreneurship using a cross-country lens.

A small amount of nominal wage stickiness makes limited asset market participation (LAMP) irrelevant for the design of monetary policy. Recent research argues that LAMP could invert the slope of the IS curve in otherwise standard New Keynesian models. This, in turn, implies that optimal monetary policy rules should be passive. We show that the so-called inverted aggregate demand logic (IADL) relies on nominal wage flexibility. Outside of extreme parameterizations, wage stickiness prevents the inversion of the slope of the IS curve. Hence, LAMP does not generally alter the trade-offs faced by a welfare maximizing Central Bank, and for this reason it does not fundamentally affect the design of optimal simple rules and optimal monetary policy. (JEL E21, E52).