Commercial Collaboration Research Articles

A qualitative study exploring teenagers and their parents’ ethical judgments toward influencers as brand ambassadors

PurposeThe purpose of this study is exploring teenagers’ (aged 11–17) and their parents’ reflections and insights regarding influencer marketing on social media, with a particular focus on advertising literacy and associated ethical perspectives. It examines the impact of influencer marketing on teenagers’ decision-making processes and emphasizes the importance of influencers clearly indicating their advertising collaborations. The study delves into the ethical aspects of advertising literacy, highlighting the significant role that transparent signaling of commercial collaborations plays.Design/methodology/approachThe research involved conducting 40 interviews with both teenagers and one of their parents.FindingsThe study highlights a divergence in perspectives between teenagers and their parents regarding influencer marketing. While parents emphasized the importance of influencers clearly disclosing the commercial nature of sponsored content, teenagers did not see this as necessary. Additionally, the study found that parents often overlooked the ethical implications of honesty in influencer marketing discussions.Originality/valueThese findings underscore the importance of further exploring the complexities surrounding influencer marketing dynamics and the crucial role that parents can play in promoting ethical advertising literacy among teenagers.

Conflicts of Interest in Nutrition: Categorical Thinking and the Stigma of Commercial Collaboration

There is a high level of concern about the possible influence of commercial organizations on food-related research and professional bodies, including regulatory and advisory panels. This has contributed to an increased emphasis on the declaration and management of conflicts of interest (CoI) in the reporting, evaluation, and application of research in nutrition science. However, common perceptions of CoI in nutrition, and procedures for declaring and managing these, often lack intellectual rigor and consistency. This commentary highlights 3 main issues related to CoI in nutrition, particularly the emphasis on industry-related CoI relative to other sources of conflict and bias. 1) Considerations of CoI in nutrition are largely limited to financial or collaborative links to the food industry, disregarding other important sources of influence such as intellectual allegiances or nonindustry financial and professional incentives. 2) Associations with industry incur ad hominem, often punitive stigmatization of individuals and their research, and inappropriate downgrading or exclusion of evidence. This disproportionately affects expertise in the food and agricultural sciences, in which commercial collaborations are widely encouraged. 3) These practices and related approaches to managing CoI are applied without due consideration of the nature of the conflicts and activities involved, the qualifications of individuals, or the availability of other, objective methods and guidance for assessing research quality and risks of bias. Overall, recognition of the nature and range of CoI in nutrition and approaches to their identification and management lack consistency and balance. A singular and strict focus specifically on industry-related CoI may paradoxically exacerbate rather than mitigate imbalance and bias in the field. This commentary outlines the underlying issues and the need for more comprehensive and nuanced approaches to the assessment, reporting, and management of CoI in nutrition.

“This kind of life has no meaning”

“This kind of life has no meaning”

Gwadar port's geostrategic significance: a gateway to regional prosperity and integration

Gwadar port is playing a pivotal part in its transformative trajectory. It possesses significant geostrategic value and is a crucial economic and strategic chokepoint due to its advantageous location, providing direct access to the Indian Ocean. Gwadar, recognised as the third-largest deep-water port globally, distinguishes itself by its ability to accommodate supertankers weighing up to 200,000 tons. This unique feature positions Gwadar as the only port in the region capable of handling vessels of such significant size. This maritime prowess positions Gwadar as vital in global trade and maritime activities. The depletion of global oil reserves and the increasing need for energy have greatly enhanced Pakistan’s geopolitical significance. The country is positioned to become a significant hub for energy and commercial lines, connecting the economically dynamic areas of China, Afghanistan, and Central Asia. The strategic posture holds great importance as it corresponds with the evolving dynamics of international energy markets. This paper examines various ramifications of Gwadar’s rise, analysing the possibility of spatial and commercial collaborations to stimulate regional integration. By examining the potential for collaboration in energy, trade, and infrastructure development, the analysis reveals the significant influence of Gwadar on the economic and geopolitical landscape of the associated regions.

Influencers as ideological intermediaries: promotional politics and authenticity labour in influencer collaborations

Though politics and promotion have never been completely separate, the convergence between the two spheres is increasingly prominent in today’s digital culture. To broaden our understanding of such promotional politics in social media, this paper examines commercial collaborations between four Swedish influencers and two private companies that offer services enabled by specific neoliberal reforms during recent decades, and how they strive to present these services in a way that attracts an affluent but socially conscious middle-class. It argues that the political potential of influencers might not always be as spokespersons for a cause or party, but rather as ‘ideological intermediaries’ who promote a lifestyle to be inspired by, and aspire to. The analysis identifies the discourses that influencers draw on to achieve the promotional and ideological outcomes of commercial collaborations, as well as the authenticity labour that they perform in the texts. Further, the paper analyses how notions of authenticity also impact audiences’ interpretation and politicization of the collaborations, in the comment sections to the sponsored blogposts.

Social Media Influencers as Mediators of Commercial Messages

Social media influencers are integral to contemporary organizations’ marketing strategies. Despite growing interest in the topic, there is scant knowledge of how organizations manage and collaborate with influencers in their content production during commercial collaborations. Drawing on semi-structured interviews and a semiotic analysis of social media content, this study elucidates the dynamics of organizations’ commercial collaborations with influencers and discusses how influencers decode and transmit organizations’ commercial messages to their followers in the destination marketing context. Social reality and commercial messages are enmeshed in the content narrative and interpreted by the influencer and their knowledge of their audience into what they could mean and become in the semiotic and symbolic landscapes of social media environments. Thus, an influencer’s interpretation of organization’s commercial messages is embedded in the social media environment.

Instructor Development Workshops for Advanced Life Support Training Courses Held in a Fully Virtual Space: Observational Study.

BackgroundVarious face-to-face training opportunities have been lost due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Instructor development workshops for advanced resuscitation (ie, advanced life support) training courses are no exception. Virtual reality (VR) is an attractive strategy for remote training. However, to our knowledge, there are no reports of resuscitation instructor training programs being held in a virtual space.ObjectiveThis study aimed to investigate the learning effects of an instructor development workshop that was conducted in a virtual space.MethodsIn this observational study, we created a virtual workshop space by using NEUTRANS (Synamon Inc)—a commercial VR collaboration service. The instructor development workshop for the advanced life support training course was held in a virtual space (ie, termed the VR course) as a certified workshop by the Japanese Association of Acute Medicine. We asked 13 instructor candidates (students) who participated in the VR course to provide a workshop report (VR group). Reports from a previously held face-to-face workshop (ie, the face-to-face course and group) were likewise prepared for comparison. A total of 5 certified instructor trainers viewed and scored the reports on a 5-point Likert scale.ResultsAll students completed the VR course without any problems and received certificates of completion. The scores for the VR group and the face-to-face group did not differ at the level of statistical significance (median 3.8, IQR 3.8-4.0 and median 4.2, IQR 3.9-4.2, respectively; P=.41).ConclusionsWe successfully conducted an instructor development workshop in a virtual space. The degree of learning in the virtual workshop was the same as that in the face-to-face workshop.

Blazing a trail for commercial TCR T cell therapy

Dr Helen Tayton-Martin has served as our Chief Business Officer since March 2017 and is a member of our Executive Team. She formerly served as our Chief Operating Officer since 2008, a role in which she oversaw the transition of all operations in the company from five to 300 staff, through transatlantic growth, multiple clinical, academic and commercial collaborations and private and public financing through to its Nasdaq IPO. As our CBO, Dr Tayton-Martin is responsible for optimizing the strategic and commercial opportunity for Adaptimmune’s assets, leading on business development and alliance management. Her role encompasses all aspects of pipeline and technology assessment, strategic portfolio analysis and partnerships, including the company’s strategic partnerships with GlaxoSmithKline (LSE/NYSE: GSK), Astellas and Genentech, a member of the Roche Group (SIX: RO, ROG; OTCQX: RHHBY). Dr Tayton Martin has over 26 years of experience working within the pharma, biotech and consulting environment in disciplines across preclinical and clinical development, outsourcing, strategic planning, due diligence and business development. She co founded Adaptimmune from the former company, Avidex Limited, where she had been responsible for business development of the soluble TCR program in cancer and HIV from 2005 to 2008. Dr Tayton Martin previously served as a non executive director of Trillium Therapeutics Inc. (Nasdaq and TSX: TRIL) from October 2017 through the sale of the company in November 2021to Pfizer Inc. She holds a PhD in molecular immunology from the University of Bristol, UK and an MBA from London Business School.

In Search of Stability: Ben Bella’s Algeria Seen from the Italian Point of View

Based on unpublished documents from the recently declassified archives of the Italian Foreign Ministry, this article aims to provide an in-depth analysis of the facts that transpired during the presidency of Ahmed Ben Bella (1962–1965) in Algeria, from the Italian point of view. From the story and the point of view of Italian diplomatic representations in North Africa, three critical moments for the young independent state in the 3 years following the ceasefire of 19 March 1962 are analysed: the crisis of the summer of 1962, the Sands War of October 1963 and the coup d’état of Boumedienne of 19 June 1965. This article argues that Italian diplomats in Algeria were all intent on their mission, seeking with their analyses to understand when a certain stability in the country could be glimpsed, such as to allow the government of Rome to launch important investments and lasting technical and commercial collaboration agreements.

A Critical Analysis of the Role of Economic Corridors in the Rise of China in Asia

The purpose of this research study was to critically analyze the plans of China to develop its economy by connecting itself with the rest of the world through roads network. For this purpose, qualitative research was adopted in which secondary sources were taken. The literature available was thoroughly reviewed, and an interpretive analysis technique was used to analyze and reach a conclusion. The study has concluded that the economic corridor of Central and West Asia has to face a multitude of problems, but these regions are also replete with natural resources. The challenges like infrastructure development and lack of funds could hamper local growth. The study observes that the CCWAEC will promote economic and commercial collaboration and capital flows to these regions and improve regional economic and social development.

Aspects, Impediments and Prospects of South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (SAARC)


 
 Combined with common features such as historical context, geographical proximity, common characteristics of social and political values, the amount of material and human resources inspired the recognition of the South Asian block known as SAARC (South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation). The SAARC sanction plots alluring objectives and goals that are intended to advance nearer trade, economic, cultural, and social relations in South Asia. The association has passed a few goals and archives to seek after these destinations. This regional alliance has a great deal of potential for advancing trade, economic relations, education, travel industry, health care, women empowerment, terrorism, human development, communication, and agriculture development. The key concept behind this co-operational of regional partners was the extension of commercial, political, and social collaboration, a shared understanding of the region's tacit use, and persistence in countering threats
 
 
 
 

An open innovation B2B web platform design: application of the QFD approach for the definition of its primary functions

Global markets and the concept of innovation require modern companies to quickly adapt to two very relevant paradigms: digital innovation and open innovation. Therefore, the use of digital technologies and the development of open collaboration networks have radically changed the nature of the organisation of innovation and of the managerial approach and strategic choices. The objective of this paper is to describe the approach adopted to define the main functionalities of a digital Business to Business (B2B) platform for the development of new commercial collaborations between Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). The approach of Quality Function Deployment and its House of Quality tool have been applied to support the combination of customer and technical needs. The prioritisation of the technical characteristics of the platform has identified in the 'system for managing orders' and 'systems to speed up processes' the main functions to be developed with greater attention within the platform.

Measuring Safety Culture: Qualitative and Quantitative Means of Measuring Safety Culture for Safety Management System Optimization

The Department of Transportation Office of the Inspector General (2020) investigated the Federal Aviation Administration oversight of Southwest Airlines Safety Management System and noted concerns and gaps in the oversight, specifically with the lack of guidance provided to inspectors in evaluating organizational safety culture. Using the published report as a case study, this work researched different peer-reviewed articles using qualitative and quantitative means to investigate the benefits, limitations, and assumptions of measuring an organizational safety culture. While different methods were used, academia seems to have settled on definitions for safety culture and safety climate with the majority of researchers using survey instruments to collect data. However, commercially available safety culture evaluations seem to use consultant experience instead of academic findings for curriculum and evaluation development. The Federal Aviation Administration could facilitate academic and commercial collaboration to improve guidance to inspectors and resolve gaps in oversight of safety culture in Safety Management Systems.

The Making of Pombal: Speculation, Diplomacy and the Iberian Enlightenment, c.1714–1755

AbstractThis article sheds light on the influence of José de Carvajal y Lancaster's establishment of shareholder companies in Spain on the economic programme of Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo, better known as the Marquis of Pombal. Early eighteenth‐century Spanish debates on the capacity of shareholder companies to foster geopolitical reform informed the overlooked project of European cooperation of José de Carvajal y Lancaster. Carvalho studied and praised Carvajal's commercial reforms and understood that closer diplomatic and commercial collaboration between Spain and Britain would undermine Portugal's geopolitical interests. Carvalho's early economic schemes were thus the result, in part, of Iberian commercial emulation. The Iberian establishment of regulated and joint‐stock companies catalysed reform and reconfigured trans‐imperial commercial relations. Paradoxically, Carvajal and Carvalho's parallel views on European geopolitics, and their understanding of Enlightenment ideals, foreclosed the possibility of a Luso‐Spanish alliance.

Between real and virtual, map and terrain: ScanLab Projects, Post-lenticular Landscapes

London-based company ScanLab Projects is a multi-disciplinary commercial collaboration between architect, artist, coders and designers who utilize technologies surrounding 3D laser scanning in their practice. Inherent in the manner their projects are pitched is through reference to the photographic as technological process. Central to their engagement with the light detection and ranging (LiDAR) scanning apparatus is a consideration of the relationality between virtual or digital object and what could be determined as extrinsic or ‘real’ terrain. In Post-lenticular Landscapes, 2017, ScanLab created a series of LiDAR scans of Yosemite National Park. The landscape, presented as a stereoscopic film work where the spectator flies through an ephemeral black and white point cloud, is contextualized relationally to a certain photo-historical context and lineage: As Yosemite is synonymous with the advent of photographic process through the work of Muybridge, Watkins, Woods and Adams, the work revisits an archetypal image of the American sublime. In this text, I unpack ScanLab’s usage and conceptualization of LiDAR scans referentially to an understanding of the photographic. By considering how ScanLab frames our understanding of the project through the technological apparatus, the text attempts to problematize the scans by reading them through a particular art historic heritage. In this context, I posit alternate ways of reading the work, specifically through reference to the image of Yosemite that has proliferated across the desktops of Apple computers since 2014. Furthermore, through a reading of metonymy in the writing of Eelco Runia, the eerie as understood by Mark Fisher and in relation to Lev Manovich’s description of photorealism, I propose that the future of the mediation and understandings of machinic vision are to be thought with a reconsidered notion of the photographic.

Comparative Analysis between the Integrating Company model and the Export Consortium in Mexico

Globalization has forced entrepreneurs of all types of companies to orient their steps of commercial leadership, to search for new forms of internationalization in order to be at the forefront of business transcendence. In Mexico, about 98% are small and medium-sized companies who seek to consolidate their exportable offer through different forms of international commercial collaboration. These figures involve substantive benefits such as: fair trade, specialization and the consolidation of the exportable supply. This research will address the figures of Integrative Company and the Export Consortium to make a comparison between both forms of international business cooperation. This qualitative research with a grounded theory research design had an extensive review of the literature that was carried out. It is concluded that although both figures have similar characteristics, the Integrating Company model offers more fiscal support to microenterprises, while the Export Consortium focuses on the work of small and medium enterprises.

Slow knowledge in the ‘real world’. Using slow practice to actively engage commercial collaborators in doctoral research

Slow knowledge in design thinking and practice has potential to create value in organisations outside of the academic and artistic settings. However, its adoption is challenged by ideological tensions with the imperatives of the commercial context. This article reports on part of a practice-based doctoral research project aiming to introduce this theory into the commercial design context. The six slow design principles provide a useful framework, whilst the slow practice tools help negotiate the engagements. Preliminary findings indicate arenas where the introduction of slow knowledge can create new value for commercial organisations. This article focuses on the methods and tools employed in overcoming the challenges of introducing the theory into this setting, and conducting effective collaborations to reveal potential benefits. The mind-set of the researcher-practitioner plays a significant role in negotiating access to people and resources, and negotiating value for both the collaborator and the research imperatives.

Ambiguous heritage and the place of tourism: Bangkok’s Rattanakosin

ABSTRACTBangkok’s ancient city, Rattanakosin, is a major tourism focus displaying palaces, temples, exotic street life and frenetic waterfront. However, this ‘first-level’ heritage landscape makes little sense dissociated from that of an underlying ‘second level,’ comprising surviving remnants and lost memories of a vast array of other palaces whose occupants sustained the ancient Siamese state and accounted for a present culture of royal-elite-military hegemony. The first five Chakri kings had an immense multiplicity of sons who could serve as defenders of both realm and dynasty, later as royal ministers and administrators and as commercial collaborators. Multiple daughters were useful in buying loyalty of an often restive nobility. Royal fecundity, however, posed a real-estate challenge as sons had to be housed appropriately, calling for an extraordinary profusion of both large and small palaces. While most have now been swept away for other development, the remnants constitute a suppressed and uninterpreted cultural landscape that also intersects with multiple sites of both dark and hedonistic tourism. These intersections of first and second levels of heritage, then with both dark and hedonistic levels of heritage-identity, yield ambiguity, demanding interpretation.

\u2018C\u2019 is for commercial collaboration: enterprise and structure in the \u2018middle market\u2019 of counterfeit alcohol distribution

This article utilising the work of Pearson and Hobbs [1] defines the middle market in counterfeit alcohol. Drugs markets have a resemblance to counterfeit alcohol markets in as much that they share the illicit nature of the product and the need to distribute the product at the ‘street’ level. Drawing on two case studies taken from a European regulator the article details the dynamics of the market, the enterprise actions of the actors and how law enforcement responses can, in certain circumstances, make the task of the distributors easier. The traditional notions of organised crime are challenged and organisation of counterfeit alcohol markets is viewed as being reliant upon those who have legitimate access to the market and are able to develop networks of commercial collaborators who by their position in the legitimate market are able to conceal their illicit actions.

A Mobile Phone-Based Health Coaching Intervention for Weight Loss and Blood Pressure Reduction in a National Payer Population: A Retrospective Study.

BackgroundThe prevalence of obesity and associated metabolic conditions continue to be challenging and costly to address for health care systems; 71% of American adults were overweight, with 35% of men and 40% of women diagnosed with obesity in 2014. Digital health coaching is an innovative approach to decreasing the barriers of cost and accessibility of receiving health coaching for the prevention and management of chronic disease in overweight or obese individuals.ObjectiveTo evaluate the early impact of a mobile phone-based health coaching service on weight loss and blood pressure management in a commercially insured population.MethodsThis was a retrospective study using existing registry data from a pilot commercial collaboration between Vida Health and a large national insurance provider, which enrolled adult members who were overweight (body mass index >25 kg/m2) and able to engage in a mobile phone-based coaching intervention. Participants received 4 months of intensive health coaching via live video, phone, and text message through the Vida Health app. Participants were also provided with a wireless scale, pedometer, and blood pressure cuff. Of the 1012 enrolled, 763 (75.40%) participants had an initial weight upon enrollment and final weight between 3 and 5 months from enrollment; they served as our intervention group. There were 73 participants out of the 1012 (7.21%) who had weight data 4 months prior to and after Vida coaching, who served as the matched-pair control group.ResultsParticipants in the intervention group lost an average of 3.23% total body weight (TBW) at 4 months of coaching and 28.6% (218/763) intervention participants achieved a clinically significant weight loss of 5% or more of TBW, with an average of 9.46% weight loss in this cohort. In the matched-pair control group, participants gained on average 1.81% TBW in 4 months without Vida coaching and lost, on average, 2.47% TBW after 4 months of Vida coaching, demonstrating a statistically significant difference of 4.28% in mean percentage weight change (P<.001). Among 151 intervention participants with blood pressure data, 112 (74.2%) had a baseline blood pressure that was above the goal (systolic blood pressure >120 mmHg); 55 out of 112 (49.1%) participants improved their blood pressure at 4 months by an entire hypertensive stage—as defined by the Seventh Report of the Joint National Committee on Prevention, Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Pressure.ConclusionsMobile phone app-based health coaching interventions can be an acceptable and effective means to promote weight loss and improve blood pressure management in overweight or obese individuals. Given the ubiquity of mobile phones, digital health coaching may be an innovative solution to decreasing barriers of access to much-needed weight management interventions for obesity.