Medium-sized Industrial Firms Research Articles

Policies to Foster Environmental Sustainability in Small and medium-sized industrial firms in East Asia

Policies to Foster Environmental Sustainability in Small and medium-sized industrial firms in East Asia

An Exploratory Analysis of Sustainability Indicators in Turkish Small- and Medium-Sized Industrial Enterprises

Significant differences exist between the sustainability practices of large businesses and those of small- and medium-sized enterprises in the industrial sector. Small- and medium-sized enterprises have restricted access to capital, resources, and experience. Most sustainable manufacturing strategies are based on indicators and evaluation models developed for large firms. This study aims to identify sustainability indicators for small- and medium-sized industrial firms. The sustainability indicators are generated from the G4-specific standard disclosures of the Global Reporting Initiative, which provide a triple-bottom-line approach. A total of 142 senior and middle sustainability-focused managers and partners participated in the survey. An exploratory factor analysis was performed in the first step, and 12 key factors were found. The Best–Worst Method (BWM) was employed in the second step to rank the criteria in order of priority. As a theoretical contribution, this study introduces human rights and economic impact on society as two additional sustainability indicators for small- and medium-sized enterprises. The two most significant aspects of sustainability for Turkish small- and medium-sized businesses are labor rights and energy saving. This study provides empirical evidence from a broad range of stakeholders for the conceptually addressed challenges of sustainability in prior studies. The results demonstrate empirically that the sustainability-based value creation for stakeholder interests, such as employees at the core of business activities, is greater in small and medium enterprises than for other stakeholders. This study’s findings will give managers a framework for establishing key sustainability indicators for allocating the limited resources of small- and medium-sized enterprises.

Indonesia Local Industry Structure and Firms Productivity in Industrial Area

Using three industry structure indices: specialization, diversification, and competition, we explore how local industry structure may affect firm productivity in the industrial estates. Based on unbalanced panel data of large and medium-sized industrial firms in Indonesia during 2010-2015, our study found that local industry structure influences firm productivity, measured as total factor productivity (TFP). The effect differs between firms outside the industrial estate and firms in the industrial estate. Specialization decreases the productivity of both firms in the industrial estate and outside. Diversification has a positive effect on increasing firm productivity in the industrial estate. As for firms outside the industrial estate, diversification has a negative effect, but the effect is less significant. Meanwhile, local industry competition has a positive and significant effect on firm productivity outside the industrial estate, but the effect is not significant for firms within the industrial estate. Empirically, firms in industrial estates may only benefit from a diversified local industry structure.JEL Classification: D24, L52, R10How to Cite:Rinayanti., & Qibthiyyah, R. M. (2021). Indonesia Local Industry Structure and Firms Productivity in Industrial Area. Signifikan: Jurnal Ilmu Ekonomi, 10(1), 93-112. doi: http://doi.org/10.15408/sjie.v10i1.17197.

Urban house prices and investments in small and medium-sized industrial firms: Evidence from provinces of Iran

Using data from provinces of Iran from 2005 to 2016 and applying panel cointegrating regressions, I find that increases in real house prices have a negative and statistically significant effect on investments in small and medium-sized industrial firms. There are at least three possible mechanisms through which increases in house prices adversely affect industrial entrepreneurship. They (1) generate housing construction investment opportunities with high returns, (2) attract many urban adults with tertiary education to the real estate brokerage industry, and (3) encourage people to save more to buy houses (which is one of the prerequisites for marriage in Iran).

HOW FUNDING STRUCTURE AFFECTS EFFICIENCY OF R&D INVESTMENT BY LARGE- AND MEDIUM-SIZED INDUSTRIAL FIRMS IN CHINA? EVIDENCE FROM PROVINCE-LEVEL PANEL DATA

This study explores the efficiencies of firm’s R&D investment depending on the degree of reliance on government funding relative to firms’ private funding. Stochastic frontier analysis is applied on a sample of 30 provinces with data on R&D inputs and innovation outputs by all large- and medium-sized industrial firms in these provinces from 2000 to 2013. It is found that R&D investment financed by firms’ private funding is more efficient than that by government funding in generating new products, whereas R&D investment financed by government funding is more efficient than that by firms’ private funding in producing new patents.

Developing and validating a multi-dimensional scale for operationalizing industrial service offering

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to develop a new scale for measuring the scope (i.e. breadth and depth) of industrial service offering.Design/methodology/approachThe scale and its constructs are developed by combining the key insights from prior literature and practitioners gained through expert interviews; validating the constructs by 3 item-construct validation rounds with 9 academic experts; and by testing and further revising the scale, with a sample of 91 manufacturing firms.FindingsThe distinct contribution of the study is the construction and validation of a new multi-dimensional scale for operationalizing the scope of industrial service offering. In addition, the identified service categories (i.e. pre-sales services, product support services, product life-cycle services, R&D services and operational services) extend the current literature on service typologies.Research limitations/implicationsThe data are somewhat biased toward small- and medium-sized industrial firms. Hence, the development of the measurement in the context of large industrial firms provides one fruitful avenue for further research.Practical implicationsFor managers of industrial firms, the identified service categories provide novel insight on how to develop, bundle and commercialize industrial services to their varying customer segments.Originality/valueThis study develops a multi-dimensional, fine-grained, statistical and relationship-level scale for measuring the scope of industrial service business. Moreover, this study tests and further develops the scale with quantitative empirical data.

The determinants of productivity in Chinese large and medium-sized industrial firms, 1998–2007

Using a large firm-level dataset, this paper examines total factor productivity (TFP) and its determinants in China. Our preferred GMM estimation results indicate increasing returns to scale in most industries and a usually large positive trend representing technical change. Various firm characteristics such as age, ownership, political affiliation, export behavior, liquidity, and geographic location are included in the production function. Our results show that in the context of China’s institutional background, including such factors is important when estimating TFP. The average TFP growth in Chinese industries is 9.6 % per annum during the period 1998–2007, and is mainly driven by firm entry. The sub-sector decomposition exercises show that the inter-firm resource reallocations are more prominent across industries than across provinces.

The Effect of Corporate Culture and Market Orientation on Iranian Industrial SMEs’ Performance

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the simultaneous effect of Corporate Culture and market orientation on the performance of small to medium-sized industrial manufacturing firms. To this end, a cross-sectional survey and variance based structural equation modeling was used for testing the hypotheses. The samples were selected based on a stratified sampling of commodity and specialty industries and consisted of 392 executives and marketing managers of Iranian industrial SMEs. The results show that the classical route among corporate culture- market orientation-customer performance- financial performance was significant and positive. The direct impact of market orientation and Corporate Culture on financial performance was not confirmed. The value of the paper is to provide unique knowledge about the effect of Corporate Culture and market orientation in small to medium-sized businesses against other larger organizations.

New Patterns in Corporate Sustainable Development?

Based on longitudinal data, collected in the Danish industry over a period of almost two decades, this paper addresses how strategic decision-makers have responded to the influence of stakeholders with regard to the natural environment in terms of prioritizing its relevance as manifested in their activities over time. More specifically, it seeks to answer how the stakeholders’ perceived influence develops over time and if and how changes have affected firms’ environmental activities. Based on a pre-tested structured questionnaire distributed to a random sample of small and medium-sized industrial firms in Denmark, data has been collected on an identical basis every fourth year since 1995. Before concluding, the paper addresses key implications for corporate managers and other affected decision-makers. The study concludes, that the sustainability topic has succeeded in gradually moving up the strategic agenda in industry (despite the presence of a severe international crisis during the last part of the period) suggesting that environmental strategic initiatives have become an enduring or lasting endeavour.

Study on the characteristics of top managers and strategic options in different industries over a time period

This research examines the effect of the characteristics of top managers on the strategic options of firms in different industries. The sample consists of 191 medium-sized industrial firms in the following industries: food, textiles and clothing, chemicals and plastics, and metallurgy and metallomechanics. Data refer to the beginning and end of the 1990s. The study was developed using upper echelon theory and demonstrates the existence of different relations between manager characteristics and strategic options, depending on the activity of firms. These relationships vary over time in association with the economic and social context.

A Study on Collaboration between Medical Professionals and Japanese Small and Medium-Sized Industrial Firms

A Study on Collaboration between Medical Professionals and Japanese Small and Medium-Sized Industrial Firms

Soos, K. A.: Politics and policies in post-communist transition. Primary and secondary privatisation in central Europe and the former Soviet Union

Drawing on an extensive survey of studies on privatisation, Karoly Attila Soos gives an account of the privatisation process in six post-communist countries during thefirst decade of transition. His aim is to observe and explain how and to what extent the ownership structure of medium-sized and large industrial firms concentrated during and after the formal privatisation process, leaving aside both small and strategic firms (for example in the financial or infrastructure sectors). Soos develops a resolutely comparative perspective and has selected six countries which illustrate the full range ofpossiblepost-communistprivatisationmethods—Hungary(mainlyprivatisationfor cash to strategic investors), the Czech Republic (mainly mass privatisation), Poland (mixed methods including mass privatisation and insider privatisation), and Russia, Slovenia and Ukraine (mainly insider privatisation)—and which also exhibit different levels of development and different socio-economic socialist legacies. This book’s interest stems from its differences from existing analyses in at least four respects. First, Soos analyses not only changes in ownership structures during privatisation stricto sensu, but also how ownership concentration increased after the first transfer of ownership from the state to private owners. Second, Soos pays “particular attention to interrelations between the processes of privatisation and the political transition from communism to a new system” to an extent that goes beyond what most existing economic studies do. Third, this emphasis on political aspects is linked to his double experience as a member of Parliament and Secretary of state in the early 1990s, and as an academic economist at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, which allows him to combine academic discussions with a more applied, hands-on perspective which is one of the book’s welcome specificities. Fourth, Soos has chosen not to delve into the details of the immense variety of privatisation developments in

The Effects of Federalism on Productivity in Chinese Firms

This study offers empirical evidence about how the structure of government and private ownership affected productivity in Chinese firms. It uses the microdata of China's last decennial industrial census, covering all of the 23,000 large and medium-sized industrial firms operating in China during 1995. The results show that government decentralization – ‘federalism’ – played an important role in improving the performance of not just collective firms, but also state-owned and mixed public/private ownership firms. This result is strongly confirmatory of much of the recent theoretical work on transition economies that posits a key role for government in the efficient operation of markets.

Analyzing internationalization configurations of SME's: The purchaser's perspective

This article focuses on the international purchasing behavior of small- and medium-sized industrial firms in Denmark. Based on taxonomy of internationalization configurations defined by the import and the export share of firms, the article explores the differences in these configurations seen from a purchasing perspective. The taxonomy reveals four internationalization configurations: international sourcers, globals, locals, and international sellers. Based on the taxonomy, the researchers diagnose the differences between firms in each of the configurations and find that psychic distance, risk, and control are unimportant factors compared to conventional findings. On the other hand, close cooperation between the firm and the international partners is important when explaining differences in internationalization configurations. The paper concludes by recommending possibilities for future research and by advising managers as to increase their success.

Bankruptcy prediction: the influence of the year prior to failure selected for model building and the effects in a period of economic decline: Research Articles

Using large amounts of data from small and medium-sized industrial firms, this study examines two aspects of bankruptcy prediction: the influence of the year prior to failure selected for model building and the effects in a period of economic decline. The results show that especially models generated from the final annual report published prior to bankruptcy were less successful in the timely prediction of failure. Furthermore, it was found that economic decline coincided with the deterioration of a model's performance. With respect to the methods used, we found that neural networks had a somewhat better overall performance than multiple discriminant analysis. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Bankruptcy prediction: the influence of the year prior to failure selected for model building and the effects in a period of economic decline

Using large amounts of data from small and medium-sized industrial firms, this study examines two aspects of bankruptcy prediction: the influence of the year prior to failure selected for model building and the effects in a period of economic decline. The results show that especially models generated from the final annual report published prior to bankruptcy were less successful in the timely prediction of failure. Furthermore, it was found that economic decline coincided with the deterioration of a model's performance. With respect to the methods used, we found that neural networks had a somewhat better overall performance than multiple discriminant analysis.

The prediction of bankruptcy of small- and medium-sized industrial firms

Using large amounts of data from small- and medium-sized industrial firms, this study examines several aspects of bankruptcy prediction. We have tested a hypothesis on the predictive power of different ratio categories during the successive phases before bankruptcy, and one on the relationship between the age of a firm and the predictability of bankruptcy. It was found that virtually every ratio investigated had some predictive power, and that the univariate and multivariate importance of ratio stability were not very high.

Small and medium-sized firms' import behavior: The case of Danish industrial purchasers

This paper focuses on the foreign purchase behavior of small and medium-sized industrial firms in a small European country, and is guided by three main research issues: (1) to what extent are small and medium-sized firms involved in international sourcing; (2) how do small and medium-sized firms initially make contact with foreign suppliers, and what are their motives for choosing a supplier; and (3) how do small and medium-sized firms perceive relationships with foreign suppliers in terms of perceived problems and cooperation? Through a survey administered in Denmark, the results show that small and medium-sized industrial firms are highly involved in international purchasing both within the European Union and abroad. Surprisingly, this involvement does not appear to be significantly driven by lack of domestic availability. Instead, the primary drivers for choosing a foreign supplier are price and quality. Finally, product adaptation appears to be a significant element of relationship formation between importers and their suppliers. The paper concludes with a discussion of results, implications, and directions for future research.

Boards of directors in small and medium-sized industrial firms: examining the effects of the board's working style on board task performance

Increased attention towards the role of the board makes demands on reforms in the boardroom. In many countries, even small and medium-sized firms are experiencing the challenges of creating well functioning boards. In this paper the authors examine the importance of structures and processes in the boardroom of 302 small and medium-sized industrial firms in Sweden. The contribution of the paper is not only that it tries to explore the relationship between processes in the board and board performance, but also that it pays attention to the working structures that exist to maximize the board's task performance. In this study board task performance is measured as the performance of various control and service roles. There are two main findings. (1) The board members' involvement, and (2) the board's formal structures are important for the board's ability to perform its tasks effectively. The findings empirically support the arguments about the importance of a good and clearly defined working style in the board.

Le développement international des PMI des régions intermédiaires : la communauté valencienne

Small and medium-sized industrial firms and international development: the case of the Valencia region. — Industry in intermediary areas is characterised by a number of features common to the whole Mediterranean region: the predominance of small and medium-sized family firms, specialisation by sector and organisation of flexible industrial systems. Although it corresponds to these characteristics, industry in the Valencia region encounters difficulties in adapting to the new conditions of the single market and of worldwide economy. Two types of small and medium-sized industries are to be found in the area: a) those best prepared to take advantage of the single market, i.e. the innovative industries, b) the non- exporting firms, based on more conservative strategies such as technology acquisition and improvement of commercial structures.