Small and Medium sized Enterprises’ Collaborative Buyer-Supplier Relationships: Boundary Spanning Individual Perspectives

Boundary-spanning individuals (BSIs) play a critical role in supply chain management, especially in small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) where interactions with buyers and suppliers can depend heavily on just a few individuals. This study, utilizing data from Korean manufacturing-sector SMEs, explores whether cooperative social value orientations of SMEs’ BSIs influence the effects of collaborative buyer-supplier initiatives. The results suggested that the performance implication of decision-sharing initiative increases when BSIs have a high level of cooperative social value orientation. However, it also negatively moderates the relationship between risk/benefit sharing (involving financial losses or gains) and performance suggesting possible negative side-effects. However, we found that such orientation also negatively moderates the relationship between risk/benefit sharing (involving direct financial losses or gains) and relationship performance suggesting possible negative side-effects

Investigating the Fair Treatment of Suppliers and its Trust Fostering Role and Performance Benefits

An increasing number of companies have begun to make efforts to treat their suppliers fairly as a part of wider corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives. Few studies, however, have investigated the performance implications of such efforts for buying firms. This paper uses both organisational climate theory and social exchange theory to investigate (1) if buying firms' efforts in the form of a code of conduct for its procurement practitioners pay off, and (2) its mechanisms from the perspectives of procurement practitioners. We use a multi-method approach, combining analysis of survey data complemented by results from a behavioural experiment. First, survey data were gathered from 327 Korean manufacturing companies and analysed using structural equation modelling. Second, the findings were complemented by a behavioural experiment involving 120 subjects. The results support the positive performance implications of fair supplier treatment in the form of codes of conduct for procurement practitioners. The paper also offers insights into how such efforts benefit buying firms, which is due to the trust in the buyer-supplier relationship fostered by the resulting ethical behaviours of procurement practitioners

Measurements of exclusive B_s^0 decays at the Y(5S) resonance

Several exclusive $B_s^0$ decays are studied using a 1.86 fb-1 data sample collected at the Y(5S) resonance with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric energy e^+ e^- collider. In the $B_s^0 \to D_s^- \pi^+$ decay mode we find 10 $B_s^0$ candidates and measure the corresponding branching fraction. Combining the B_s^0 -> D_s^{(*)-} \pi^+, B_s^0 -> D_s^{(*)-} \rho^+, B_s^0 -> J/\psi \phi and B_s^0 -> J/\psi \eta decay modes, a significant $B_s^0$ signal is observed. The ratio \sigma (e^+ e^- -> B_s^* \bar{B}_s^*) / \sigma (e^+ e^- -> B_s^{(*)} \bar{B}_s^{(*)}) = (93^{+7}_{-9} \pm 1)% is obtained at the Y(5S) energy, indicating that $B_s^0$ meson production proceeds predominantly through the creation of $B^*_s \bar{B}^*_s$ pairs. The $B_s^0$ and $B_s^*$ meson masses are measured to be M(B_s^0)=(5370 \pm 1 \pm 3)MeV/c^2 and M(B_s^*)=(5418 \pm 1 \pm 3)MeV/c^2. Upper limits on the B_s^0 -> \gamma \gamma, B_s^0 -> \phi \gamma, B_s^0 -> K^+ K^- and B_s^0 -> D_s^{(*)+} D_s^{(*)-} branching fractions are also reported.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figures, published in Phys. Rev. D76, 012002 (2007

Search for Resonant B±→K±h→K±γγB^{\pm}\to K^{\pm} h \to K^{\pm} \gamma \gamma Decays at Belle

We report measurements and searches for resonant $B^{\pm} \to K^{\pm} h \to K^{\pm} \gamma \gamma$ decays where $h$ is a $\eta,\eta^{\prime},\eta_{c},\eta_{c}(2S),\chi_{c0},\chi_{c2},J/\psi$ meson or the X(3872) particle.Comment: accepted by Physics Letters

Search for Lepton-Flavor-Violating tau Decays into a Lepton and an f0(980) Meson

We search for lepton-flavor-violating tau decays into a lepton (electron or muon) and an f0(980) meson using 671 fb-1 of data collected with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric-energy e+e- collider. No events are observed and we set the following 90% C.L. upper limits on the branching fraction products: B(tau- -> e-f0(980))*B(f0(980)->pi+pi-) mu-f0(980))*B(f0(980) -> pi+pi-)<3.4x10^-8. This is the first search performed for these modes.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures, submitted to Phys. Lett.

Study of charmonia in four-meson final states produced in two-photon collisions

We report measurements of charmonia produced in two-photon collisions and decaying to four-meson final states, where the meson is either a charged pion or a charged kaon. The analysis is based on a 395fb^{-1} data sample accumulated with the Belle detector at the KEKB electron-positron collider. We observe signals for the three C-even charmonia eta_c(1S), chi_{c0}(1P) and chi_{c2}(1P) in the pi^+pi^-pi^+pi^-, K^+K^-pi^+pi^- and K^+K^-K^+K^- decay modes. No clear signals for eta_c(2S) production are found in these decay modes. We have also studied resonant structures in charmonium decays to two-body intermediate meson resonances. We report the products of the two-photon decay width and the branching fractions, Gamma_{gamma gamma}B, for each of the charmonium decay modes.Comment: 22 pages, 12 figure

Search for B+ -> D*+ pi0 decay

We report on a search for the doubly Cabibbo suppressed decay B+ -> D*+ pi0, based on a data sample of 657 million BBbar pairs collected at the Upsilon(4S) resonance with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric energy e+ e- collider. We find no significant signal and set an upper limit of Br(B+ -> D*+ pi0) < 3.6 x 10^-6 at the 90% confidence level. This limit can be used to constrain the ratio between suppressed and favored B -> D* pi decay amplitudes, r < 0.051, at the 90% confidence level.Comment: 5pages, 2figures, submitted to PRL (v1); PRL published version (v2: minor corrections in the text

Observation of the ϕ(1680)\phi(1680) and the Y(2175) in e+e−→ϕπ+π−e^+ e^- \to \phi\pi^+\pi^-

The cross sections for $e^+ e^- \to \phi\pi^+\pi^-$ and e^+ e^- \to \phi \fzero are measured from threshold to $\sqrt{s}=3.0$ $\hbox{GeV}$ using initial state radiation. The analysis is based on a data sample of 673 fb$^{-1}$ collected on and below the $\Upsilon(4S)$ resonance with the Belle detector at the KEKB asymmetric-energy $e^+e^-$ collider. First measurements are reported for the resonance parameters of the $\phi(1680)$ in the $\phi\pi^+\pi^-$ mode: $m=(1689\pm 7\pm 10)$ MeV/$c^2$ and $\Gamma=(211\pm 14\pm 19)$ MeV/$c^2$. A structure at $\sqrt{s}=2.1 \hbox{GeV}/c^2$, corresponding to the so called Y(2175), is observed; its mass and width are determined to be $2079\pm13^{+79}_{-28}$ MeV/$c^2$ and $192\pm23^{+25}_{-61} \hbox{MeV}/c^2$, respectively.Comment: 11 pages, 6 figures. Add one plot. Accepted by Phys.Rev.D(RC

Moments of the Hadronic Invariant Mass Spectrum in B --> X_c l nu Decays at Belle

We present a measurement of the hadronic invariant mass squared (M^2_X) spectrum in charmed semileptonic B meson decays B --> X_c l nu based on 140 fb^-1 of Belle data collected near the Y(4S) resonance. We determine the first, the second central and the second non-central moments of this spectrum for lepton energy thresholds ranging between 0.7 and 1.9 GeV. Full correlations between these measurements are evaluated.Comment: published version of the paper (one figure added, minor changes in the text); 16 pages, 3 figures, 10 table

Observation of Ds1(2536)+ -> D+pi-K+ and angular decomposition of Ds1(2536)+ -> D*+K0S

Using 462/fb of e+e- annihilation data recorded by the Belle detector, we report the first observation of the decay Ds1(2536)+ -> D+pi-K+. The ratio of branching fractions B(Ds1+ -> D+pi-K+)/B(Ds1+ -> D*+K0) is measured to be (3.27+-0.18+-0.37)%. We also study the angular distributions in the Ds1(2536)+ -> D*+K0S decay and measure the ratio of D- and S-wave amplitudes. The S-wave dominates, with a partial width of Gamma_S/Gamma_total=0.72+-0.05+-0.01.Comment: Submitted to Phys.Rev.D 16 pages, 6 figures, 3 table