International Competitiveness

Global strategic alliances, those whose area of work crosses borders, can accelerate the overseas expansion of the company. This article presents a detailed analysis of the different fast-track alliance-based international expansion strategies. In particular, it presents a typology based on the external resources a company needs in order to sell its products to a wider market. The main contribution of this article is to show how all types of businesses can benefit from global alliances,

This paper investigates how countries become specialised in exporting specific producer services, particularly financial, communication and business services. We find that a country's ability to develop a competitive service economy depends on the structure of its manufacturing sector as some manufacturing industries are more intensive users of these services. Moreover, we find a virtuous cycle as the same service producers are also intensive users of these producer services. Finally we find that information and communication technologies have a significant impact on trade performance of these producer services.

The paper uses the key role of technology as starting point in determining trade flows and international competitiveness at indusry and country level as a growing number of theoretical contributions and empirical verifications have recognized over the past decade. The paper uses a set of new data on trade, production, technology and costs at industry level for a certain number of countries to relate trade performance to a set of different economic and technological factors across countries and industrial sectors since the early 1970s. A single model of trade specialization is applied to the data in order to establish the impact of innovation, costs and country specific factors to overall performance, both in the short run and the long run, via a panel data analysis. Model specification follows the cointegration approach, where a long-run cointegrating vector is estimated along with the dynamic adjustment towards long-run equilibrium. The paper presents some preliminary results, related to a certain number of different industrial sectors for the major industrialized countries.

Employment statistics of Mexican-American, Cuban-American, and Puerto Rican men and women are compared with each 4other and with blacks and whites. Facts and figures are provided for geographic distribution4 labor force participation (employed or seeking a job), typ% of occupation (blue-collar or white-collar), and income. Barriers to employment which are discussed include lack of English fluency, lowAdvel of education, and discrimination. Finally; the recommendations ok the National Commission on Employment Policy for improving the employment situation of'Hispanic-Americans are described. (DC) 4.

An indicator of competitive position, the cost difference between ethanol import from Brazil with sugar processing and domestic production with corn in the United States under ideal conditions without tariffs in the ethanol market, is developed conceptually+ An ex ante version of the indicator that is based on historical prices and today's technology is calculated for the last 30 years and subjected to time series analysis+ Results suggest that there are no trends, but there are cyclical periods of advantage for both industries+ Further, long-term averages suggest that profits would be similar in both countries under ideal trade conditions+ However, the corn wet-milling industry may have slightly higher profits than other processes and locations+ Finally, the U+S+ dry-milling industry could improve its competitive position using modified corn varieties with high starch content, and using corn residues for biomass generation of electrical and heat energy+ @EconLit Classifications: F140, L650, Q420#+

The transistor was an American invention, and American firms led the world in semiconductor production and innovation for the first three decades of that industry's existence. In the 1980s, however, Japanese producers began to challenge American dominance. Shrill cries arose from the literature of public policy, warning that the American semiconductor industry would soon share the fate of the lamented American consumer electronics business. Few dissented from the implications: the only hope for salvation would be to adopt Japanese-style public policies and imitate the kinds of capabilities Japanese firms possessed. But the predicted extinction never occurred. Instead, American firms surged back during the 1990s, and it now seems the Japanese who are embattled. This striking American turnaround has gone largely unremarked upon in the public policy literature. And even scholarship in strategic management, which thrives on stories of success instead of stories of failure, has been comparatively silent. Drawing on a more thorough economic history of the worldwide semiconductor industry (Langlois and Steinmueller 1999), this essay attempts to collect some of the lessons for strategy research of the American resurgence. We argue that, although some of the American response did consist in changing or augmenting capabilities, most of the renewed American success is in fact the result not of imitating superior Japanese capabilities but rather of taking good advantage of a set of capabilities developed in the heyday of American dominance. Serendipity played at least as important a role as did strategy.

This paper overviews 9 vandalism detectors that have been developed and evaluated within PAN'10. We start with a survey of 55 different kinds of features employed in the detectors. Then, the detectors' performances are evaluated in detail based on precision, recall, and the receiver operating characteristic. Finally, we set up a meta detector that combines all detectors into one, which turns out to outperform even the best performing detector.

We examine anticipatory product standards intended to improve the strategic position of firms in an international patent race where firms do R&D to develop products that are close substitutes. The effects of a standard are shown to depend on the way the standard is specified, which firm develops which product, and on the order in which products are discovered. Simple standards are, in general, time inconsistent because of consumer losses that occur when products ruled out by the standard are discovered before the product set as the standard. A state contingent standard is shown to be time consistent when compulsory licensing by the foreign firm is introduced.

Earlier literature has analysed regional finance gaps by comparing metropolitan areas with peripheral areas on a relatively high level of aggregation and most often in a U.S. or U.K. venture capital context. Financial capital has been found to be concentrated in metropolitan areas and access to capital easier because en-trepreneurs leverage on proximity to capital providers. However, regardless of whether it is metropoles, when there is an urban centre of a certain size or relative dominance in a region, it can be hypothesized that financial capital is likely to be attracted to this urban centre even within a peripheral region. The literature has been silent regarding financial ?centres’ within peripheral areas. Survey responses from managers in 834 firms are used in the empirical analyses. We find indications of differences in whether firms are financially constrained depending on the levels and types of geographical aggregation that are used in the models. In other words, even wit...

Since exporting is the most popular mechanism by which firms engage with international markets, understanding the drivers of export market performance is key to explaining firms' international competitiveness. The literature posits that the effective implementation of planned export marketing strategy is a key determinant of the performance of firms operating in international markets. Yet little is known about the specific nature and drivers of export marketing strategy implementation effectiveness. In this study we build on the implementation literature in marketing and strategic management to develop a new conceptualization of export marketing strategy implementation effectiveness. Drawing on dynamic capabilities theory, we empirically examine the export marketing capability antecedents and performance consequences of export marketing strategy implementation effectiveness in the context of manufacturing firms that are exporting to international markets. Results indicate that effective implementation of planned export marketing strategy contributes to export market and financial performance, and that marketing capabilities play an important role in enabling effective marketing strategy implementation in export venture operations.

This paper examines factors driving ICT adoption at firm level. We use a novel data set including information on ICT and e-commerce in Irish manufacturing firms over the period 2001-2004 and estimate a model derived from the new technology adoption literature that relates ICT adoption indicators to two sets of factors: characteristics of firms and characteristics of the environment in which firms operate. Our research results indicate that the adoption of ICT in Irish manufacturing has been uneven across firms, industries and space. On average, other things equal, firms with more skilled workers, operating in ICT producing and ICT using industries, located in the capital city region have been relatively more successful in adopting and using ICT. To a certain extent, patterns of ICT adoption have been different for domestic and foreign-owned firms, in particular with respect to the effects of international competitive pressure and firm size.

Materials published here have a working paper character. They can be subject to further publication. The views and opinions expressed here reflect the author(s) point of view and not necessarily those of CASE Network. This paper was produced in the framework of MICRO-DYN (www.micro-dyn.eu ), an international economic research project focusing on the competitiveness of firms, regions and industries in the knowledge-based economy. The project is funded by the EU Sixth Framework Programme (www.cordis.lu). This publication reflects only the author's views, the European Community is not liable for any use that may be made of the information contained therein. The publication was financed from an institutional grant extended by Rabobank Polska S.A. English proofreading by Paulina Szyrmer.

Materials published here have a working paper character. They can be subject to further publication. The views and opinions expressed here reflect the author(s) point of view and not necessarily those of CASE Network. This paper presents research results obtained within the ongoing FP 6 research project sponsored by DG-Research of the EC. The project is entitled MICRODYN -The competitiveness of firms, regions and industries in the knowledge-based economy: What room for job-rich growth in Europe? and is being carried out by a consortium of 16 European universities and institutes (including CASE -Center for Social and Economic Research) and led by WIIW -Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies. More information about the project is available at www.micro-dyn.eu The publication was financed from an institutional grant extended by Rabobank Polska S.A. English proofreading by Paulina Szyrmer.

Regional investment in R&D, technological development and innovation is perceived as being strongly associated with productivity, growth and sustained international competitiveness. One policy instrument by which policy makers have attempted to create regional advantage has been the establishment of publicly funded research centres (PRCs). In this paper we develop a logic model for this type of regional intervention and examine the outputs and longer-term outcomes from a group of (18) publicly funded R&D centres. Our results suggest some positive regional impacts but also identify significant differences in terms of innovation, additionality and sustainability between university-based and company-based PRCs. University-based PRCs have higher levels of short-term additionality, demonstrate higher levels of organisational innovation but prove less sustainable. Company-based PRCs demonstrate more partial additionality in the short-term but ultimately prove more sustainable.

The crucial role of employers and managers in the development of industrial relations has been the focus of much recent research. However, there remains little consensus on key issues such as the determinants of managerial strategies, or employers' contribution to differing national patterns of industrial relations. The Power to Manage? argues that many of these difficulties stem from the limitations of the theoretical frameworks within which the research has been carried out. Both Marxist and mainstream perspectives subordinate managerial choices to the pressures of the market or the broader patterns of business development. In consequence, these approaches cannot explain the persistent diversity of employers' labour policies or the prevalence of contradictory and incoherent strategies. Using the 'peculiarities' of British industrial relations as a point of departure, the contributors to this volume present detailed empirical studies of employer labour policies in a variety of countries. These, together with the substantial introduction and conclusion by the editors, establish a comparative framework within which the distinctiveness of British developments can be evaluated and point the way towards a new interpretation of the employer's role in industrial relations.

Exports attract special attention in the economic literature and practice due to its contribution to the stability and long term development of any economy, particularly small one as Croatian economy. Also, its role is additionally augmented in the contemporary context of increasing global competition. The multifold contributions of exports are particularly evident in accelerating of economic growth not only directly through production, but also indirectly, through facilitating the imports of goods and services, transferring and spreading out of new ideas, knowledge and technologies, i.e. through forcing all stakeholders to more innovative behavior and increased productivity. Furthermore, it contributes to resolving of macroeconomic problems like unemployment and external debt which is of significant importance when their current dimension in Croatia is considered. Export volume and structure portray export performance of an economy and indicate the level of its international compet...

After joining the WTO in December 2001, China was given 5 years to completely open up its banking market for international competition. Chinese banks have been renowned for their mounting non-performing loans and low efficiency. Despite gradual reforms, the banking system is still dominated by state ownership and encapsulated monopolistic control. How to raise efficiency is a key to the survival and success of domestic banks, especially the state-owned commercial banks. Two important factors may be responsible for raising efficiency: ownership reform and hard budget constraints. This paper uses a panel data of 22 banks over the period 1995-2001, and employs a stochastic frontier production function to investigate the effects of ownership structure and hard budget constraint on efficiency. Empirical results suggest that non-state banks were 8-18% more efficient than state banks, and that banks facing a harder budget tend to perform better than those heavily capitalized by the state or regional governments. The results shed important light on banking sector reform in China to face the tough challenges after WTO accession.

The International Agricultural Trade and Policy Center (IATPC) was established in 1990 in the Food & Resource Economics Department (FRED) of the Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS) at the University of Florida. Its mission is to provide information, education, and research directed to immediate and long-term enhancement and sustainability of international trade and natural resource use. Its scope includes not only trade and related policy issues, but also agricultural, rural, resource, environmental, food, state, national and international policies, regulations, and issues that influence trade and development. The Center's objectives are to: -Support initiatives that enable a better understanding of U.S. and international trade policy issues impacting the competitiveness of Florida agriculture and all specialty crops and livestock nationwide; -Serve as a nationwide resource base for research on international agricultural trade policy issues on all specialty crops and livestock; -Disseminate agricultural trade related research results and publications; -Interact with researchers, business and industry groups, state and federal agencies, and policymakers to examine and discuss agricultural trade policy questions. Programs in the IATPC have been organized around five key program areas.

Michael Porter and others suggest that the interactive dynamics between industrially related organizations within a circumscribed geographic area can help to form an "industry cluster", where the dynamics helps them to substantially improve their international competitiveness compared to organizations working in isolation. Following suggestions based on a paradigm of organizational emergence, the authors have intervened in their local area to see if they can crystallize the emergence of an industry cluster to address the ICT needs of organizational knowledge management. Although the ultimate success of the interventions remains to be demonstrated, this paper outlines the theoretical framework, some interventions, and the results of these interventions towards formation of an active cluster. We have observed that some low cost interventions appear to successfully build the kinds of interpersonal knowledge transfer relationships that historical studies suggest facilitate the emergence of successful clusters.

Far-reaching transformations took place throughout the global automotive industry during the nineties, as the final assemblers of motor vehicles diffused technological and organisational changes throughout their production chains. As these new production practices reach into developing country markets, and in particular throughout the Latin American automotive industry, it is important to understand the implications that this raises for industrial organisation, the basis for continued technological development in these countries and the scope for competitive insertion in international and regional markets. One of the keys to understanding the extent of these transformations is to examine changes in inter-firm relations, between the automotive assemblers and their suppliers of components.

Authors: Dr Anura Amarasena and Dr Sisira Colombage

Exporting in the Asian Century: The Dynamics of Success delves into the evolving landscape of international trade, with a focus on the role of small firms exporting from developed to developing countries. Using a mixed-methods approach, the book investigates how Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), particularly internet applications, impact the export performance of Australian small firms targeting niche markets in Sri Lanka. It identifies the dynamic capabilities of owner-managers as critical to bridging gaps in cultural understanding, business diplomacy, and leveraging technology. The conceptual framework presented highlights the interplay between human factors and technological advancements, offering strategic insights for sustained competitiveness. This book is an essential resource for entrepreneurs, policymakers, and researchers aiming to explore innovative approaches in international business within the Asian context.

Rencon (Performance Rendering Contest) is an annual international competition at which entrants present the computer systems they have developed for generating expressive musical performances and audience members and organizers judge the performances. Recent advances in performance rendering technology have brought with them the need for a means for researchers in this area to obtain feedback about the abilities of their systems in comparison so those of other researchers. At the ICMPC10, the competition will consist of an autonomous section (for evaluating the ability of the entered systems to generate performances autonomously) and a system-supported section (for evaluating human performances done using computer systems). The autonomous section aims to evaluate performances rendered by autonomous computer systems using e.g. a rule-based or case-based approach, and the system-supported section aims to build common ground for evaluating human performances done using computer systems.

O custo conjunto e um ramo da contabilidade de custos, aplicado a producao conjunta, em que a partir de uma determinada materia prima sao elaborados diversos produtos que podem ser classificados como coprodutos, subprodutos ou sucatas. Assim, o objetivo deste estudo e identificar a influencia dos diferentes metodos de alocacao dos custos conjuntos no resultado de uma empresa extratora de minerio, localizada na cidade de Rio Branco do Sul/PR. A entidade produz a partir do calcario dolomitico branco dez coprodutos com caracteristicas homogeneas que ocasiona uma pequena diferenca de preco entre eles, e um unico subproduto. A analise consiste em aplicar os quatro metodos principais para a alocacao dos custos conjuntos a partir das informacoes coletadas junto a empresa. A pesquisa e de natureza aplicada, qualitativa quanto a forma de abordagem do problema, descritiva quanto ao seu objetivo, de corte transversal com relacao ao horizonte de analise, de construcao de caso quanto a estrategi...

This paper aims to contribute to internationalization literature by showing that a born global may use some of its subsidiaries as bases for gradually expanding further. Based on a case of a Belarusian door producer founded in 2000 that has invested to Austria, USA, Iran, Germany, Mexico, Turkey and Italy and, in addition, exported to 8 more countries, we also conclude that a home country's political and economic environment may be a crucial 'push' factor for a firm's fast internationalization.

This paper analyses the link between sustainability-related innovation and sustainability performance and the role that family firms play in this. This theme is particular relevant from a European point of view given the large number of firms that are family-owned. Governments often support environmentally and socially beneficial innovation with various policy instruments with the intention is to increase international competitiveness and simultaneously support sustainable development. In parallel, firms use corporate social responsibility (CSR) and environmental management systems partly in the hope that this will foster such innovation in their organisation. Hence the main research question of this paper is about the association of CSR and environmental management with environmentally and socially beneficial innovation and its determinants. Based on panel data, the paper analyses the link of corporate sustainability performance with sustainability innovation and the effect of bein...

Thermal Energy Storage (TES) technology based on the use of Phase Change Materials (PCM) has recently raised an important practical interest. This is mainly due to the highenergy storage density during phase change within a very narrow temperature range. To give an illustrative example, eighty times more heat is required to melt certain amount of ice at 0 C than to heat up 1 C the same amount of water. In this paper, novel cooling unit using PCM called Indirect Evaporative and Storage Unit (IESU) has been designed, modeled and simulated through over the year. Moreover IESU has been optimized from technical and economic point of view for residential application in Mediterranean climate. Cooling systems with heat storage have attracted an increasing attention over the past decades. However, studies of IESU haven't been found in open literature.

This paper describes an integrated robot system, known as Curious George, that has demonstrated state-of-the-art capabilities to recognize objects in the real world. We describe the capabilities of this system, including: the ability to access web-based training data automatically and in near real-time; the ability to model the visual appearance and 3D shape of a wide variety of object categories; navigation abilities such as exploration, mapping and path following; the ability to decompose the environment based on 3D structure, allowing for attention to be focused on regions of interest; the ability to capture high-quality images of objects in the environment; and finally, the ability to correctly label those objects with high accuracy. The competence of the combined system has been validated by entry into an international competition where Curious George has been among the top performing systems each year. We discuss the implications of such successful object recognition for society, and provide several avenues for potential improvement.

Vertical intra-industry trade dominates horizontal intra-industry trade in Korea. A time series analysis on both these types of intra-industry trade yields the following: (1) vertical intra industry trade was caused by the rapid economic development that the Korean economy experienced in the past thirty years and (2) horizontal intra-industry trade was more random in nature caused only by the aggregate volume of trade.

The paper investigates revealed comparative advantage (RCA) and trade map index (TM) for the textile and clothing industries between Iran and Turkey during 2001-2009. The results of the RCA indicated that, Iran recorded a relatively weak comparative advantage in the export of textile industry and no comparative advantage in the clothing industry for a short period from 2001 to 2003, while Turkey recorded a strong comparative advantage in both textile and clothing industries during the whole period. Given the fact that the two counties are neighbors and both have access to each other's markets makes us conclude that Iranian textile and clothing industries will be the net loser. Estimating TM index illustrated that in both textile and clothing industries the world market have been declining. Based on the TM index, while Iran has been a loser, in contrast, Turkey has been a winner in both industries. Thus, Iran needs better comprehension of the world market and requires taking necessary steps through marketing, adoption of new technology and quality improvement in order to assert its place in the world market of the textile and clothing industry.

The goal of this review is to use business theories in student retention research, which has so far been informed by economics, organizational behavior, psychology, sociology. Relationships in business networks are compared to these between students and universities, putting forth relevant characteristics for student churn/retention research. Theories regarding a taxonomy of customer churn, its determinants and consequences are also viewed in this context and implications for educational data mining (DM) are put forth.

The goal of this review is to use business theories in student retention research, which has so far been informed by economics, organizational behavior, psychology, sociology. Relationships in business networks are compared to these between students and universities, putting forth relevant characteristics for student churn/retention research. Theories regarding a taxonomy of customer churn, its determinants and consequences are also viewed in this context and implications for educational data mining (DM) are put forth.

Working Paper 09/8 is a Research Project on "European Union policies, economic and trade integration processes and WTO negotiations" financed by the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research (Scientific Research Programs of National Relevance, 2007). Information about the project, the partners involved and its outputs can be found at http://www.ecostat.unical.it/anania/PUE&PIEC.htm.

Using a gravity model for trade, this work analyzes the factors influencing the patterns of international hazardous waste flows, relying on newly available data reported in the E-PRTR (European Pollutant Release and Transfer Registry) for EU-OECD countries over the period 2007 to 2014. Exploiting a consolidated empirical framework (Kellenberg, 2012), we test two empirical hypotheses: firstly, we explicitly assess if, according to the pollution heaven hypothesis (PHH), the relative levels of environmental policies across countries are an important determinant of hazardous waste trade, and secondly, we test if technological specialization, proxied here by a technology-specific patent stock, can be considered as a pull factor capable to influence the patterns of international trade of hazardous waste.

Este estudo analisa os impactos regionais de curto/médio prazo na pobreza e na distribuição de renda ocasionados pela redução nas tarifas de importação brasileiras como conseqüência dos recentes acordos de livre-comércio. Por meio de um modelo de equilíbrio geral computável, os resultados obtidos mostram que, apesar de o comércio reduzir a desigualdade de renda interregional , os pobres em áreas urbanas sofrem impactos negativos com a liberalização comercial, ou seja, existe um trade-off entre ganhos agregados de bem-estar e as perdas para famílias de baixa renda em áreas urbanas. Políticas comerciais adotadas isoladamente são insuficientes para atingir uma distribuição de renda mais igualitária em níveis global e regional no Brasil. * Os autores gostariam de agradecer ao pesquisador Hans Lofgren, do Banco Mundial, por gentilmente disponibilizar a matriz de contabilidade social (SAM) para o Brasil, que serviu de base para a obtenção da SAM desagregada em nível regional. Adicionalmente os autores agradecem os comentários e sugestões de Armando Vaz Sampaio, Joaquim Bento de S. Ferreira Filho, Márcio José Vargas da Cruz, Thomas Rutherford e dos pareceristas anônimos desta revista. Os erros remanescentes são de inteira responsabilidade dos autores. Bittencourt agradece à Fundação Capes pelo suporte financeiro.

The present paper studies the relationship among two variables that are often used as indicators of development-GDP per capita, Human Development Index (HDI)-with respect to the five pillars of Global Sustainable Competitiveness Index (GSCI), namely Natural Capital, Resource Intensity, Social Capital, Intellectual Capital, and Governance Performance. The objective is to gain insight how these five pillars impact the GDP per capita and the HDI through the assessment of polynomial regression models. By analyzing these relationships through linear polynomial regression models, certain inferences can be made as to which variable influenced the most these indicators of development. For this purpose, data from SolAbility Sustainable Intelligence's Global Sustainable Competitiveness Report of 2020 are analyzed for 166 countries. Key findings include that of the five pillars four have statistically significant impact on the GDP per capita which is often used as a proxy for estimating living standards. Considering the HDI, a measure of human development, the same four pillars, namely the Resource Intensity, Social Capital, Intellectual Capital, and Governance Performance Competitiveness have an influence that is significant according to the regression analysis. Resource Intensity has an inverse relationship-a decrease in one percent results in greater GDP per capita and the HDI while the other three pillars have a positive relationship: an increase in these scores leads to greater GDP per capita and HDI, on average, according to the sample data.

La internacionalización de las organizaciones aparece como una posibilidad de crecimiento empresarial o por lo menos una estratagema para la supervivencia en el mundo globalizado, altamente competitivo y sujeto a continuos y complejos cambios. El propósito de este documento es describir la gestión estratégica de las áreas funcionales de la empresa-técnica, comercial, financiera, contable, de seguridad y administrativa-como requisito para la competitividad internacional. Para hacerlo, se recurre al método analítico-sintético enunciando las presiones del entorno global que transforman las áreas funcionales de la empresa. Luego se plantean algunas de las posibles estrategias aplicables en cada área que facilitan la c o m p e t i t i v i d a d i n t e r n a c i o n a l d e l a s organizaciones. Con base en los referentes teóricos se concluye que la gestión estratégica de las áreas de la empresa es una de las múltiples formas de desarrollar capacidades que faciliten la internacionalización organizacional. Es necesario ampliar el debate para continuamente completar las estrategias aplicables desde una perspectiva gerencial.

Word Sense Disambiguation (WSD) is considered one of the most important problems in Natural Language Processing [1]. It is claimed that WSD is essential for those applications that require of language comprehension modules such as search engines, machine translation systems, automatic answer machines, second life agents, etc. Moreover, with the huge amounts of information in Internet and the fact that this information is continuosly growing in different languages, we are encourage to deal with cross-lingual scenarios where WSD systems are also needed. On the other hand, Lexical Substitution (LS) refers to the process of finding a substitute word for a source word in a given sentence. The LS task needs to be approached by firstly disambiguating the source word, therefore, these two tasks (WSD and LS) are somehow related. In this paper, we present a naïve approach to tackle the problem of cross-lingual WSD and cross-lingual lexical substitution. We use a bilingual statistical dictionary, which is calculated with Giza++ by using the EUROPARL parallel corpus, in order to calculate the probability of a source word to be translated to a target word (which is assumed to be the correct sense of the source word but in a different language). Two versions of the probabilistic model are tested: unweighted and weighted. The results were compared with those of an international competition, obtaining a good performance.

We present a theory of corporate campaigns and private regulation, with a focus on welfare implications. An activist induces private regulation through campaigns aimed at harming the …rm's reputation. In equilibrium, campaigns have both static and dynamic e¤ects, which have fairly di¤erent but complementary e¤ects on social welfare. The canonical case in which an activist campaign increases welfare involves a …rm that cares intensely about protecting itself against reputation loss, an activist that is not excessively "passionate," and a campaign aimed at addressing a high-stakes negative externality. Finally, campaigns resulting in private regulation that is essentially redistributive necessarily reduce welfare. JEL L31, D60 We are grateful to Davin Raiha for his helpful comments, and we thank participants at the 14th Annual Strategy and the Environment Conference, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, April 2014 for their useful suggestions and questions.

The U.S. Congress established the East-West Center in 1960 to foster mutual understanding and cooperation among the governments and peoples of the Asia Pacific region including the United States. Funding for the Center comes from the U.S. government with additional support provided by private agencies, individuals, corporations, and Asian and Pacific governments.

_ We examine anticipatory prcxiuct standards intended to improve the strategic position of fInns in an international patent race where fInns do R&D to develop products that are close substitutes. The effects of a standard are shown to depend on the way the standard is specified, which ftnn develops which product, and on the order in which products are discovered. Simple standards are, in general, time inconsistent because of consumer losses that occur when products ruled out by the standard are discovered before the product set as the standard. A state-contingent standard is shown to be time consistent when compulsory licensing by the foreign ['mn is introduced.

This study extends previous research by comparing banks across European Union (EU) accession and non-accession countries of central-eastern Europe in order to detect differences that perhaps have implications related to policy prescriptions for joining the EU. Using commercial banking data from 17 centraleastern European countries for 2000-04, the period leading up to the EU accessions of 2004 and 2007, a multiproduct translog cost function approach

is recognized as a leading authority on strategy and competitiveness. His works have generated analytical tools used by business schools, managers, and public policy makers: fi ve-forces analysis, generic strategies, the value chain, activity systems, the national diamond and industry innovation clusters. Broader applications of Porter's analytical frameworks have included health care, non-profi t organization strategy, economic development of inner cities, national competitiveness, clusters and innovation capacity, cross-industry linkages, environmental quality and competitiveness, and regional economic development (Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness, 2008). Prior to Porter, strategic management rested on the SWOT framework -strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats -developed by the general management group at Harvard . This approach involved checklists of factors to assess opportunities and threats in the organization's external environment and strengths and weakness in its internal environment. Although widely used, the SWOT framework lacked an analytical foundation. Other approaches such as Chandler's strategy and structure framework (1962) supplemented SWOT, drawing on business history to show how a fi rm's strategy and structure responded to changes in the external environment. Porter's Competitive Strategy (1980) transformed strategic management in six ways. First, it applied microeconomics and industrial organization (IO) concepts to business level strategy to assess the attractiveness of an industry and positions within an industry. In the 1970s Porter had himself contributed to the IO literature, analyzing the relationship between fi rm performance and external factors including exit barriers, mobility barriers, branding, and market structure . Second, the work turned the IO structure, conduct and performance approach on its head. IO had identifi ed barriers that reduced competition at the industry level. The new work asked: how could managers manipulate mobility barriers to achieve above average returns? Third, it extended the analysis of competitive forces beyond immediate rivals to include the power of suppliers and buyers, the threat of new entrants and the attraction of substitutes. The relative power of these forces determined the attractiveness and average returns of an industry. Fourth, it outlined a set of generic strategies that could create a long run defensible position with superior returns in a given industry: overall cost leadership, differentiation and focus. Fifth, it proposed

Abstract. The main objective of the beeStanbul project is to develop an efficient software system to correctly model the behaviors of simulated Nao robots in a competitive environment. The challenging and the most time consuming part of the project was the design phase of the motions. However, these motion models were successively developed towards the achievement of the main goal. This team description paper presents im-portant aspects of the overall system design and outlines the methods used in different modules.