Based on a disaggregate cross-country analysis, we investigate the performance of 10 public Swiss universities and 77 public German universities from 2001-2007. During this period the universities in both countries have faced two major reforms aimed at improving efficiency and productivity in the European higher education sector. We assess the change in productivity and its sources, that is technological change, technical efficiency change and scale effects, obtained by computing the non-parametric Malmquist productivity index by benchmarking the non-science disciplines and the science disciplines of both countries separately against a common frontier. Given the lack of statistical inference of non-parametric productivity analyses, we employ bootstrapping techniques and estimate confidence intervals, allowing us to verify the statistical significance of our results. The results indicate that improvements in technical efficiency were by far the most important driver for productivity growth, followed by gains realised through exploiting economies of scale; thereby technological change partly reduced the increases in productivity. Our findings, however, suggest reform-related differences between the Swiss and the German public university sector. Further, the results point to structural differences across the scientific disciplines, as we found divergent patterns for the development in productivity and its sources in the non-sciences and the sciences.
Standards have become critical to information and communication technologies (ICTs) as they become complex and pervasive. We propose a process theory framework to explain anticipatory standardizing outcomes post hoc when the standardizing process is viewed as networks of events. Anticipatory standards define future capabilities for ICT ex ante in contrast to ex post standardizing existing practices or capabilities through de facto standardization in the market. The theoretical framework offers the following: a) a lexicon in the form of the ontology and typology of standardizing events; b) a grammar, or a set of combination rules, for standardizing events to build process representations; c) an analysis and appreciation of contexts in which standardizing unfolds; and d) logic yielding theoretical explanations of standardizing outcomes based on the analysis of process representations. We show how the framework can help analyze standardization data as networks of events as well as explain standardizing outcomes. We illustrate the plausibility of the approach by applying it to wireless standardization to explain standardizing outcomes.
This paper studies content strategies for online publishers of digital information goods. It examines sampling strategies and compares their performance to paid content and free content strategies. A sampling strategy, where some of the content is offered for free and consumers are charged for access to the rest, is known as a "metered model" in the newspaper industry. We analyze optimal decisions concerning the size of the sample and the price of the paid content when sampling serves the dual purpose of disclosing content quality and generating advertising revenue. We show in a reduced-form model how the publisher's optimal ratio of advertising revenue to sales revenue is linked to characteristics of both the content market and the advertising market. We assume that consumers learn about content quality from the free samples in a Bayesian fashion. Surprisingly, we find that it can be optimal for the publisher to generate advertising revenue by offering free samples even when sampling reduces both prior quality expectations and content demand. In addition, we show that it can be optimal for the publisher to refrain from revealing quality through free samples when advertising effectiveness is low and content quality is high.
Für die Karriere eines Forschers der BWL zählt nur eines: die Zahl der Aufsätze in einigen Wissenschaftsjournalen. Das führt zwar zu viel Transparenz - aber zu immer weniger Wissenschaft und zu einem stärkeren Elfenbeinturm-Denken. Der wichtige Dialog mit der Praxis bleibt auf der Strecke.
The traditional carry trade has historically been highly profitable, but suffered from crash risk, the proverbial "up by the stairs and down by the elevator.'' This crash risk was realized in dramatic fashion in the wake of the Lehman bankruptcy, when an investor who was long the Australian dollar and short the yen would have lost 22% in October of 2008.In sharp contrast, a dynamic diversified portfolio constructed using mean-variance analysis performs well, even during the crash. A portfolio constructed using mean-variance analysis can identify opportunities that a more heuristic method will not detect. Once sufficiently diversified, the carry trade turns out to have been a surprisingly low-risk strategy over the last 20 years.
This book examines the diffusion process for a complex medical technology, the PET scanner, in two different health care systems, one of which is more market-oriented (Switzerland) and the other more centrally managed by a public agency (the province of Quebec in Canada). More specifically, this research draws on institutional and socio-political theories of the diffusion of innovations to examine how institutional contexts affect processes of diffusion. The study finds that diffusion proceeds more rapidly in Switzerland than in Quebec, but that processes in both jurisdictions are characterized by intense struggles among providers and between providers and public agencies.
This study shows that the institutional environment influences these processes by determining the patterns of material resources and authority available to actors in their struggles to strategically control the technology, and by constituting the discursive resources or institutional logics on which actors may legitimately draw in their struggles to give meaning to the technology in line with their interests and values. This book also illustrates how institutional structures and meanings manifest themselves in the context of specific decisions within an organizational field, and reveals the ways in which governance structures may be contested and realigned when they conflict with interests that are legitimized by dominant institutional logics. It is argued that this form of contestation and readjustment at the margins constitutes one mechanism by which institutional frameworks are tested, stretched and reproduced or redefined.
How firms build new capabilities to adapt to changing environments is at the core of strategic management. However, research has addressed this question only recently. In this paper, I propose a model that describes how firms develop a capability to create and develop ventures through corporate venture capital, alliances, and acquisitions. The model is based on two longitudinal case studies of large corporations operating in the information and communication technology sector in Europe. At the core of this model are learning processes that enable the firm to build up an external corporate venturing capability, by utilizing learning strategies both within and outside venturing relationships. To build this new capability, firms engage in acquisitive learning. Critical to deepening the capability acquired is adaptation of all knowledge to the firm specific context through experiential learning mechanisms. I also discuss the important role that initial conditions and knowledge management practices play in determining the direction and effectiveness of specific learning processes that lead to an external corporate venturing capability.
This paper discusses standardization of information and communications technologies. Standardization has become a domain of firm strategizing with information and communication technology standards being increasingly created through semi-open alliances. The paper analyzes the strategic logic of such standardization alliances based on an in-depth case study of the Bluetooth initiative. Similar to other successful standards described in the standardization literature, Bluetooth has been rapidly adopted by a large number of companies. The author argues that at least part of the success is due to the structure and design of the standardization alliance that promoted Bluetooth.
Information and communication technologies are in the process of transforming the way business is conducted in a large number of industries. The impact of this change is not well understood. This paper develops a research agenda that helps to investigate the implications of information and communication technology on selected management fields. In particular, the implications are investigated for strategic management, demand and supply chain management, logistics, organization and leadership, and management education. The research agenda is developed by first identifying impacts of information and communication technologies in the domains discussed. From these impacts, research needs are derived.
