SMEs and virtual R&D teams: a motive channel for relationship between SMEs

In today?s dynamic marketplace, manufacturing companies are under strong pressure to introduce new products for long-term survival with their competitors. Nevertheless, every company cannot cope up progressively or immediately with the market requirements due to knowledge dynamics being experienced in the competitive milieu. Increased competition and reduced product life cycles put force upon companies to develop new products faster. In response to these pressing needs, there should be some new approach compatible in flexible circumstances. This paper presents a solution based on the popular Stage-Gate system, which is closely linked with virtual team approach. Virtual teams can provide a platform to advance the knowledge-base in a company and thus to reduce time-to-market. This article introduces conceptual product development architecture under a virtual team umbrella. The paper describes all the major aspects of new product development (NPD), NPD process and its relationship with virtual teams, Stage-Gate system finally presents a modified Stage-Gate system to cope up with the changing needs. It also provides the guidelines for the successful implementation of virtual teams in new product development

SMEs: ERP or virtual collaboration teams

Small firms are indeed the engines of global economic growth. Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) play an important role to promote economic development. SMEs in the beginning of implementing new technologies always face capital shortage and need technological assistance. Available ERP systems do not fulfil the specific requirements of Small firms. SMEs has scarce resources and manpower therefore many SMEs don?t have the possessions to buy and operate an ERP System. On the other hand competition and competitiveness of SMEs have to be strengthened. This paper briefly reviews the existing perspectives on virtual teams and their effect on SMEs management. It also discusses the main characteristics of virtual teams and clarifies the differences aspects of virtual team application in SMEs. After outlining some of the main advantages and pitfall of such teams, it concentrates on comparing of ERP and virtual collaborative teams in SMEs. Finally, it provides evidence for the need of ?Software as a Service (SaaS)? where an application is hosted as a service provided to customers across the web for SMEs as an alternative of ERP. It has been widely argued that ERP disadvantage in SMEs such as administrative expenditure and cost, isolated structure, severe lack of software flexibility, insufficient support of SMEs business and high operating cost, lead SMEs to use virtual collaborative team which is net work base solution

Entrepreneurship Strategies in a Portuguese and in a Polish Region

In the present paper we will consider strategies of innovation, risk and proactivity as entre/ intrapreneurship strategies. This study was done in a Portuguese and in a Polish region. In Portugal the region was Vale do Sousa, located in the northern Portugal. The Polish region was Lublin Voivodeship and it is situated in the south-eastern part of the country. The study focused on Industrial and Construction sectors. In order to get a valid sample, a group of 251 firms were analysed in Portugal, and 215 in Poland. However, the minimum sample size in Poland should be 323. Since this is a work in progress, we are aiming for this number of questionnaires. Each strategy was analysed individually for both regions and the results pointed to a lack of culture of entrepreneurship in firms’ management. Only Proactivity presented a positive result in firms’ management. Polish firms tend to be more innovative and more risk takers, while in proactivity Portuguese ones present a slightly higher result. Combining the strategy results, it was possible to identify that 61.2% of Portuguese firms present a low level of entrepreneurship, while 60% of Polish firms present a moderate level. Considering intrapreneurship good levels, while Portugal account for 5.2% this figure is 19.1% in Poland

MANAGERS AND MANAGEMENT ON INDUSTRY AND CONSTRUCTION BUSINESSES IN THE REGION OF VALE DO SOUSA

This article goal is to analyse firms and manages behaviour on a Portuguese region on construction and industry businesses. The results are based on 251 questionnaires. Usually managers present a low level of school education (changing recently). On what regards management issues it was realized that the main reason for business choice is the past experience of firm owners, and they started their businesses at their own homes (embeddedness?). The strategies followed by these firms reveal a risk adversity attitude and a lack of cooperation, considering their neighbours competitors instead of potential business partners. As a general conclusion it can be realized that in general these firms are not fostering local development.

Fuzzy dematel method to evaluate the dimensions of marketing resources: An application in SMEs

Identifying the cause and effect factors of marketing resources and prioritizing them with respect to their level of importance can build superior market performance for companies. Although there have been some studies in the literature which have used marketing resource dimensions to conduct their research, these studies have not considered the relationships between marketing resource dimensions. Therefore, the aim of this study is to identify the cause and effect factors of marketing resources and to prioritize them in terms of their importance using the fuzzy Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory method. The findings of this study suggest that the dimension managerial capabilities, composed of financial management, effective human resource managementand good operations management expertise, exerts a greater influence on marketing strategy than other criteria. In addition, the criterion credibility with customers through being well established in the market is the most important aspect of marketing resources

Virtual R & D teams in small and medium enterprises: A literature review

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are the driving engine behind economic growth. While SMEs play a critical role in generating employment and supporting trade, they face numerous challenges, the prominent among them are the need to respond to fasting time-to-market, low-cost and rapid solutions to complex organizational problems. Towards that end, research and development (R & D) aspect deserves particular attention to promote and facilitate the operations of SMEs. Virtual R & D team could be a viable option. However, literature shows that virtual R & D teaming in SMEs is still at its infancy. This article provides a comprehensive literature review on different aspects of virtual R & D teams collected from the reputed publications. The purpose of the state-of-the-art literature review is to provide an overview on the structure and dynamics of R & D collaboration in SMEs. Specifying the foundation and importance of virtual teams, the relationship between virtual R & D team and SMEs has been examined. It concludes with the identification of the gaps in the existing literature's and calls for future research. It is argued that setting-up an infrastructure for virtual R & D team in SMEs still requires a large amount of engineering efforts and deserves consideration at top level management.Virtual teams, small and medium enterprises, literature review

Effect of market positioning on market orientation, innovation types and firm performance linkage

Market positioning activities must be carefully planned and reconciled with other marketing strategies and business activities. Most studies have assessed the impact of market orientations and innovations on firm performance. This study was designed to test the moderating effect of market positioning on the relationship between innovation types and firm performance. The study used the resource based view, the competitive advantage paradigm as a framework in testing the theoretical relationships between the constructs. The study adopted a corelational research design and it involved the use of a questionnaire-based survey of a random sample of 220 managers of Manufacturing Companies. Demographic characteristics of the respondents are presented as well as exploratory factor analysis, scale reliabilities and confirmatory factor analysis. Regression results indicate a positive relationship between market orientation, innovation types and performance. Mixed results from moderator regression analysis are presented. Conclusions and practical recommendations are given. Key Words: Market positioning, Market orientation, innovation and firm performance

Entrepreneurship and local sustainability : is there any relation? A case study in the region Vale do Sousa

Is there a relation between entrepreneurship/intrapreneurship and local sustainability? The studied region (Vale do Sousa North of Portugal) presents very low levels of entrepreneurship but the results for local sustainability are very interesting. Results are based on a questionnaire presented to 251 firms. Most firms (59%) present a low level of entrepreneurship, the same percentage present a good level of sustainability and 37% a very good level. This means that firms might be more concerned with local sustainability than firm sustainability. On entrepreneurships analyses proactively got an average result of 3,49, innovation 1,27 and risk propensity 1,06, (1 to 5 linker scale). These results lead to an inexistent relation between entrepreneurship and local sustainability.peer-reviewe

Entrepreneurship Strategies in Family and Non-family Businesses

The goal of the present paper is to analyse the classic entrepreneurship strategies (Innovation, Risk and Proactivity) in small and medium-sized businesses. However as presented in the title, the study will go further by comparing the results of those strategies in familiar and nonfamiliar businesses. This study was carried on in construction and industry sectors, in the region of Vale do Sousa, in the north of Portugal. In order to classify businesses as familiar or non-familiar types two criterion were adopted: (1) Management Control, (2) Family Employability. On the opposite to some studies that present a larger percentage of familiar businesses in national and European entrepreneurial fabric, the criterion used leaded to a larger number of non-familiar businesses (53%). The results showed that in general SMEs in this region are not following entrepreneurship strategies. Analysing the entire sample without a separation of businesses by nature (familiar/non-familiar) only proactivity showed to be more present in the managerial decisions. There is a lack of innovation and risk culture. Comparing the groups only on proactivity tests was possible to verify some differences. It was concluded that non-familiar businesses are more proactive than familiar ones. Between those groups there are no statistical differences on the means of the variables innovation and risk. At the same time some tests were conducted to test the differences on the variable entrepreneurship. The results were similar to innovation and risk strategies: There are no significant differences on entrepreneurship between these groups of businesses

A simplified model to enhance SMEs’ investment in renewable energy sources in Ghana

Although the Renewable Energy Act 2011 (Act, 832) was enacted to facilitate development and investment in the Renewable Energy sources in Ghana as part of the efforts to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 7, the actual impacts of the policy are yet to be felt as manifested in the amendment Act 2020 (Act, 1045). There is a need to develop an alternative model to enhance investment in the renewable energy sector. Drawing from the Resources Based View (RBV) and Porter’s Five Forces this paper is aimed to develop a simplified model to explain Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)investment determinants in the renewable energy sources in Ghana. We argued that the simplified integrated model provides robust predictability and wider generalization. Our paper is anchored on the positivists’ epistemology and quantitative methodology. Our hypotheses have been tested using cross-sectional data from the Ghanaian SMEs. Variance Based Partial Least Squares (PLS) method has been used to analyze the survey data. Our results indicate that entrepreneurial competency, financial resource, marketing capability, and technological usage significantly relate to investment in renewable energy. Moreover, the results have shown that competitive rivalry, the threat of entry, and bargaining power of customers significantly relate to investment in renewable energy. These results substantiate the well-known argument that industry forces and resource competitive strategies are significant determinants of a firm’s competitiveness and behavioral intentions. Overall, these results have theoretical and practical implications to facilitate the capacity of SMEs and create enabling renewable energy local content policy to enhance SMEs ’ participation in the sector.         &nbsp