Capabilities, strategy, and performance: the case of ICT firms in New Zealand.

Smaller technology-based firms are critical for many economies. This study investigates the determinants of performance in a sample of 110 firms from the information and communication technology industry in New Zealand. It is a single industry study, reflecting the industry specificity of resource-based capabilities. Partial least squares methods are used to investigate relationships between capabilities, strategy, and performance. A product-innovation strategy maximized performance, mediating innovation and human capital capabilities. Pursuing a market-expansion strategy ahead of one of product innovation led to inferior performance outcomes. Financial and organizational capabilities had direct positive effects on performance irrespective of strategy

Experiences of high-growth technology firms in Malaysia and New Zealand.

How do technology firms experience high growth and the support available from governments? This qualitative study explores the experiences of high-growth technology-based firms in Malaysia and New Zealand. Case studies were developed for eight high-growth companies in the information and communication technology sectors of each country. The countries differ in national cultures and the forms of government support. There were no marked country differences in growth drivers. Growth was driven by innovation and flexibility within business-to-business sales relationships. These firms faced four obstacles: intense competition; liabilities of smallness; limited human capital; and funding ability. Malaysia offers broader mainstream support with favourable tax treatment of R&D related expenditure. In contrast, New Zealand’s has been criticised for a highly targeted approach, although this is now broadening. Both countries appear to be converging on a hybrid approach combining mainstream and targeted support for growth businesses

Socioemotional wealth and the innovativeness of family SMEs in the United Arab Emirates.

Why are some family SMEs more innovative than others? We use the heterogeneity within family SMEs to explore how their socioemotional wealth (SEW) affects innovativeness. The ubiquity of smaller family firms means that their innovativeness is critical for policymakers, such as those in the United Arab Emirates, seeking innovation-led development. We conduct a multi-case study analysis of SEW and innovativeness in fourteen family SMEs based in the United Arab Emirates. Participants were from a range of sectors and across the employment size-range of family SMEs. None of the most innovative family SMEs had highly family-centric socioemotional wealth. High family-centricity was however evident in all the least innovative firms who survived on reputation and incremental customer or supplier-driven improvements. The least innovative firms were amongst the smallest but not the youngest, with firm age not influential for innovativeness. The paper proposes redressing family-centric SEW preferences to raise the innovativeness of family SMEs. This will involve longer-term decision-making that gives greater consideration to the interests of external stakeholder as well as future generations of the family

Facilitation of penicillin haptenation to serum proteins.

Traditionally, penicillin binding to serum proteins was believed to be a passive chemical process; however, it appears to be facilitated by serum factors. The objectives of this in vitro investigation were to examine facilitated penicillin haptenation, to study the kinetics of haptenation, and to determine the nature of haptenation-facilitating factors. The model involved addition of [3H]benzylpenicillin to serum or albumin solutions (at pH 7.3 to 7.4) and incubation at 37 degrees C for up to 72 h. The extent of penicillin binding to proteins in serum was found to be four- to fivefold higher than with solutions having comparable concentrations of purified albumin, total protein, or total immunoglobulin. Ultrafiltration of serum reduced penicillin binding to serum proteinssubstantially. An ultrafiltrable haptenation-facilitating factor(s) was found to be less than 0.5 kDa but was not calcium or magnesium. Finally, the extent of penicillin binding was related to albumin purity, as binding substantially increased with albumin purity. These findings suggest that there is a factor(s) in serum that facilitates covalent binding of penicillin to serum proteins. The factor(s) can be removed and then restored to increase penicillin binding to albumin. It appears that at least one component of the facilitation factor is less than 0.5 kDa, which suggests that it is not a peptide and that it is some simple serum component other than calcium or magnesium

David Versus Goliath: Strategic Behavior of Small Firms In Consolidated Industries

This study assesses the effect of strategy selection and firm adaptability on small firm performance,  using firm  tenure  as a moderator  variable.  The study  is based  upon interviews with sixteen small firms operating in rapidly changing and consolidating industries. All of the firms in the study pursued a differentiation strategy. Half of the firms  pursued  a  broad product strategy and more than three-quarters pursued a broad service strategy. The study found that small firms adapt by addressing community needs and forming cooperative agreements with other small firms but not larger firms. Variation among the industries studied suggests that the intensity of industry concentration affects firm adaptation decisions. For instance, while the heavily concentrated hardware anti drugstore industries  showed limited adaptation, the unconsolidated bookstore industry showed greater commitment to adaptive strategies. In addition, firm tenure was found to affect the adaptation of the small firms  studied

The frequency in Japanese of genetic variants of 22 proteins

This paper presents the results of an electrophoretic survey of approximately 4000 individuals from the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, for four serum proteins: albumin, ceruloplasmin, haptoglobin and transferrin. The haptoglobin gene frequencies obtained for the HP 1 -HP 2 polymorphism are in agreement with earlier reports. Rare electrophoretic variants of albumin, ceruloplasmin and haptoglobin occur with frequencies of 2.48, 0.50 and 0.58 per 1000 determinations, respectively. The noteworthy finding of 8 distinct transferrin variants in these populations, with a combined frequency of 20.90 per 1000 determinations, is also presented. Four of these variants (D Ch1 , B 1 , B 3 and D hir2 which corresponds electrophoretically to D 4 ) have been reported in other populations in Japan, but the other five have not previously been differentiated.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/66399/1/j.1469-1809.1977.tb01859.x.pd

Lipopolysaccharide-reactive immunoglobulin E is associated with lower mortality and organ failure in traumatically injured patients

Antilipopolysaccharide (anti-LPS) immunoglobulin G (IgG) and IgM have been associated with protection from LPS effects in vivo. We investigated the presence of IgE and anti-LPS in 32 patients that had experienced severe traumatic injury and in 35 healthy volunteers; we also investigated whether IgE anti-LPS was associated with important clinical events. Plasma samples were collected daily from patients in the intensive care unit and on one occasion from volunteers; the samples were assayed for IgE anti-LPS. IgE anti-LPS was assayed by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay with monoclonal anti-human IgE as the capture antibody. Detection was accomplished with biotin-labeled LPS (Escherichia coli J5 mutant) followed by streptavidin-peroxidase with 2,2\u27-azino(3-ethylbenzthiazoline)sulfonic acid as the substrate. The assay was demonstrated to be specific for IgE and LPS-biotin by nonreactivity of control sera with high-titer anti-LPS IgG and IgM and by inhibition with unlabeled LPS. IgE anti-LPS was detected in 1 of 35 healthy controls (2.9%o) and 25 of 32 traumatically injured patients (78%) (P \u3c 0.001). The presence of IgE anti-LPS was associated with a lower incidence of death (P = 0.026) and of renal failure (P = 0.0012). There was no apparent temporal relationship between detection of IgE anti-LPS and clinical events. IgG anti-LPS was detected more frequently in patients that were positive for IgE anti-LPS (P = 0.06) but was not associated with clinical events. The inability to detect IgE anti-LPS may be related to adverse clinical events through depletion of specific IgE due to LPS exposure after trauma or through saturation of the assay by IgE with other specificities. We have reported increased total IgE concentrations in these patients (J. T. DiPiro, R. G. Hamilton, T. R. Howdieshell, N. F. Adkinson, and A. R. Mansberger, Ann. Surg. 215:460-466, 1992)

A compactness theorem for complete Ricci shrinkers

We prove precompactness in an orbifold Cheeger-Gromov sense of complete gradient Ricci shrinkers with a lower bound on their entropy and a local integral Riemann bound. We do not need any pointwise curvature assumptions, volume or diameter bounds. In dimension four, under a technical assumption, we can replace the local integral Riemann bound by an upper bound for the Euler characteristic. The proof relies on a Gauss-Bonnet with cutoff argument.Comment: 28 pages, final version, to appear in GAF

The Soliton Transform and a Possible Application to Nonlinear Alfvén Waves in Space

We apply the inverse scattering transform (1ST) based upon the Derivative Nonlinear Schrödinger (DNLS) equation to a complex time series of nonlinear Alfvén wave data generated by numerical simulation. The IST describes the long-time evolution of quasi-parallel Alfvén waves more efficiently than the Fourier transform, which is adapted to linear, not nonlinear, problems. When we add dissipation, so the conditions for the validity of the DNLS are not strictly satisfied, the IST continues to provide a compact description of the wavefield in terms of a small number of decaying envelope solitons. Since large amplitude Alfven waves and other nonlinear waves play essential roles in various space environments--the solar wind is one obvious example--we suggest that it may be of interest to investigate how inverse scattering transforms can be developed into practical tools for the analysis of space data