ALIGNING KNOWLEDGE STRATEGY AND COMPETITIVE STRATEGY IN SMALL FIRMS

Despite the claim of more and more scholars that there is a need to align knowledge strategies with competitive strategies, little research allows for more precise conceptualizations concerning this problem of inter-level strategic fit, and few have attempted an empirical investigation. This is especially true in the specific context of small firms (SFs), despite the fact, that their knowledge-based resources are more important than their property-based resources. This study aims to investigate, through a quali-quantitative analysis carried out on a sample of SFs in northeast Italy, the alignment between knowledge strategies and competitive strategies. We have identified two types of competitive strategies pursued by SFs, i.e. human resource-based (HR-based) and product and customer service quality-based (PCSQ-based). We have also identified two types of internal knowledge strategy, i.e. exploitation strategy of internal knowledge, and exploration strategy of internal knowledge, as well as two types of external knowledge strategy, i.e. exploitation strategy of external knowledge, and exploration strategy of external knowledge. Our findings reveal that SFs pursuing HR-based competitive strategies tend to adopt exploitation strategies of both internal and external knowledge, while firms pursuing PCSQ-based competitive strategies tend to adopt exploration strategies of both internal and external knowledge

A resource-based perspective on the relationship between service diversification and firm performance: evidence from Italian facility management firms

In this article, a theoretical framework to study the effect of service diversification on firm financial performance is demonstrated. Data on 48 Italian facility management firms from between 2000 and 2009 show a consistent inverse U-shaped relationship between service diversification and firm performance, with the slope positive at low and moderate levels of service diversification but negative at high levels of service diversification. Further, the results show that firm experience in the service industry and firm affiliation to a consortium positively moderate the relationship between service diversification and performance. The results of this study provide evidence of the importance of service diversification strategies for gaining a competitive advantage

Red Queen competitive imitation in the U.K. mobile phone industry

This paper uses Red Queen competition theory to examine competitive imitation. We conceptualize imitative actions by a focal firm and its rivals along two dimensions: imitation scope, which describes the extent to which a firm imitates a wide range (as opposed to a narrow range) of new product technologies introduced by rivals; and imitation speed, namely the pace at which it imitates these technologies. We argue that focal firm imitation scope and imitation speed drive performance, as well as imitation scope and speed decisions by rivals, which in turn influence focal firm performance. We also argue that the impact of this self-reinforcing Red Queen process on firms’ actions and performance is contingent on levels of product technology heterogeneity—defined as the extent to which the industry has multiple designs, resulting in product variety. We test our hypotheses using imitative actions by mobile phone vendors and their sales performance in the U.K. from 1997 to 2008

Navigating windows of opportunity: The role of international experience

Scholars have noted that pronounced changes in consumer demand and technology often offer firms temporary opportunities to strengthen their performance vis-à-vis rivals. This article contributes to the literature on windows of opportunity from an organizational learning perspective. It investigates whether the depth and breadth of a firm's international experience with pronounced changes in demand conditions (demand windows) and technologies (technological windows) affect its ability to take advantage of such changes within a country to increase its market share. The results, based on a sample of 615 telecommunication companies competing in 124 countries, suggest that mainly two out of four dimensions of international experience help firms to exploit windows of opportunity in a country

The moderating effect of economic reputation on middle-status conformity: a study on the Italian film industry

The relationship between an actor’s status and his/her decision to conform to extant social norms of behavior or to deviate from them is a common theme in the managerial and sociological research. Drawing on previous studies that have highlighted the presence of a U- shaped relationship between status and nonconformity, whereby low-status and high-status actors are more likely to deviate from accepted norms of behavior, this paper aims at investigating how reputation moderates the relationship between status and nonconformity. By relying on a sample of more than 1,500 films introduced from 1990 to 2011 by 730 Italian film producing companies, we hypothesize and find that an organization’s economic reputation negatively moderates the curvilinear U-shaped relationship between its status and nonconformity in a way that, for high reputation, the high propensity of a high-status organization to non-conform is mitigated

G-triplex structure and formation propensity

The occurrence of a G-triplex folding intermediate of thrombin binding aptamer (TBA) has been recently predicted by metadynamics calculations, and experimentally supported by Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR), Circular Dichroism (CD) and Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) data collected on a 3′ end TBA-truncated 11-mer oligonucleotide (11-mer-3′-t-TBA). Here we present the solution structure of 11-mer-3′-t-TBA in the presence of potassium ions. This structure is the first experimental example of a G-triplex folding, where a network of Hoogsteen-like hydrogen bonds stabilizes six guanines to form two G:G:G triad planes. The G-triplex folding of 11-mer-3′-t-TBA is stabilized by the potassium ion and destabilized by increasing the temperature. The superimposition of the experimental structure with that predicted by metadynamics shows a great similarity, with only significant differences involving two loops. These new structural data show that 11-mer-3′-t-TBA assumes a G-triplex DNA conformation as its stable form, reinforcing the idea that G-triplex folding intermediates may occur in vivo in human guanine-rich sequences. NMR and CD screening of eight different constructs obtained by removing from one to four bases at either the 3′ and the 5′ ends show that only the 11-mer-3′-t-TBA yields a relatively stable G-triple

A protocol to automatically calculate homo-oligomeric protein structures through the integration of evolutionary constraints and ambiguous contacts derived from solid- or solution-state NMR

ABSTRACTProtein assemblies are involved in many important biological processes. Solid-state NMR (SSNMR) spectroscopy is a technique suitable for the structural characterization of samples with high molecular weight and thus can be applied to such assemblies. A significant bottleneck in terms of both effort and time required is the manual identification of unambiguous intermolecular contacts. This is particularly challenging for homo-oligomeric complexes, where simple uniform labeling may not be effective. We tackled this challenge by exploiting coevolution analysis to extract information on homo-oligomeric interfaces from NMR-derived ambiguous contacts. After removing the evolutionary couplings (ECs) that are already satisfied by the 3D structure of the monomer, the predicted ECs are matched with the automatically generated list of experimental contacts. This approach provides a selection of potential interface residues that is used directly in monomer-monomer docking calculations. We validated the protocol on tetrameric L-asparaginase II and dimeric Sod1

SHREC’20 Track:Retrieval of digital surfaces with similar geometric reliefs

International audienceThis paper presents the methods that have participated in the SHREC'20 contest on retrieval of surface patches with similar geometric reliefs and 1 the analysis of their performance over the benchmark created for this challenge. The goal of the context is to verify the possibility of retrieving 3D models only based on the reliefs that are present on their surface and to compare methods that are suitable for this task. This problem is related to many real world applications, such as the classification of cultural heritage goods or the analysis of different materials. To address this challenge, it is necessary to characterize the local "geometric pattern" information, possibly forgetting model size and bending. Seven groups participated in this contest and twenty runs were submitted for evaluation. The performances of the methods reveal that good results are achieved with a number of techniques that use different approaches