Optimal duration of magazine promotions.

The planning of promotions and other marketing events frequently requires manufacturers to make decisions about the optimal duration of these activities. Yet manufacturers often lack the support tools for decision making. We assume that customer decisions at the aggregated level follow a state-dependent Markov process. On the basis of the expected economic return associated with dynamic response to stimuli, we determine the ideal length of marketing events using dynamic programming optimization and apply the model to a complex promotion event. Results suggest that this methodology could help managers in the publishing industry to plan the optimal duration of promotion events.Optimal duration of promotion events; Markovian process; Dynamic programming;

Specialized advertising and price competition in vertically differentiated markets

This paper studies how the emergence of specialized communication media focused on both high quality contents and high quality advertised products, affects the functioning of a vertically differentiated market. To that end, we formulate a simultaneous game of pricing and targeted advertising with two firms producing different levels of quality. We find that the transition from uniform advertising to targeted advertising can turn a pure vertically differentiated market into a hybrid market which incorporates some features of a monopoly, thus changing the pattern of price competition between the firms. In particular, we show that (1) compared to uniform advertising, targeting leads both firms to always charge higher prices, (2) the increase in prices is more intense in highly competitive (low differentiated) markets, (3) the expected price of the low-quality firm is non-monotonic with the degree of product differentiation, and (4) the low-quality product may be sold at a higher expected price than the high-quality product. We also show that a progressive growth of specialized advertising vehicles leads to a further increase in prices. In addition, more specialized targeting may raise price competition, so firms may find it optimal to use low specialized targeting

Hydrazones as Singular Reagents in Asymmetric Organocatalysis

This Minireview summarizes strategies and developments regarding the use of hydrazones as reagents in asymmetric organocatalysis, their distinct roles in nucleophile–electrophile, cycloaddition, and cyclization reactions. The key structural elements governing the reactivity of these reagents in a preferred pathway will be discussed, as well as their different interactions with organocatalysts, leading to diverse activation modes. Along these studies, the synthetic equivalence of N-monoalkyl, N,N-dialkyl, and N-acyl hydrazones with several synthons is also highlighted. Emphasis is also put on the mechanistic studies performed to understand the observed reactivities. Finally, the functional group transformations performed from the available products has also been analyzed, highlighting the synthetic value of these methodologies, which served to access numerous families of valuable multifunctional compounds and nitrogen-containing heterocycles.Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad CTQ2013-48164-C2-1-P, CTQ201348164-C2-2-PEuropean FEDER fundsJunta de Andalucía 2012/FQM 107

Magazine sales promotion : a dynamic response analysis

This paper studies the effectiveness of a type of nonprice promotion often used in the European magazines industry to diminish the decline rate of periodical sales, in which a value pack is sold containing the magazine issue plus another product. Magazines are sold simultaneously with and without promotion at different prices, and promotions are serialized by fractioning the additional product across different issues of the magazine. Although promoting magazines contemporarily may cannibalize nonpromoted sales, this loss is compensated by a long-term increase in nonpromoted sales caused by product awareness and loyalty improvements. This strategy is increasingly used as an innovative form of product advertising.Publicad

Solvent-free synthesis of quaternary α-hydroxy α-trifluoromethyl diazenes: the key step of a nucleophilic formylation strategy

An efficient, scalable and operationally simple one-pot, 2-step strategy for the nucleophilic formylation of trifluoromethyl ketones is presented. The key step is an unprecedented diaza-carbonyl-ene reaction of formaldehyde tert-butyl hydrazone and trifluoromethyl ketones under solvent-free conditions. This reaction proved to be very fast, clean and high-yielding, affording densely functionalised α-hydroxy α-trifluoromethyl diazenes. The ensuing diazene-to-aldehyde transformation, avoiding protection/deprotection reactions and chromatographic purifications, and subsequent derivatizations in a one-pot fashion provide a direct entry to a variety of useful trifluoromethylated building blocks.We acknowledge support by the CSIC Open Access Publication Initiative through its Unit of Information Resources for Research (URICI).This work was supported by the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad of Spain (CTQ2013-48164-C2-1-P, CTQ2013-48164-C2-2-P, and predoctoral fellowship to E. M.), European FEDER funds and the Junta de Andalucía (Grant 2012/FQM 1078). D. M. acknowledges Universidad de Sevilla for a postdoctoral contract.Peer reviewe

Abacavir/Lamivudine Versus Tenofovir/Emtricitabine in Virologically Suppressed Patients Switching from Ritonavir-Boosted Protease Inhibitors to Raltegravir

There are few clinical data on the combination abacavir/lamivudine plus raltegravir. We compared the outcomes of patients from the SPIRAL trial receiving either abacavir/lamivudine or tenofovir/emtricitabine at baseline who had taken at least one dose of either raltegravir or ritonavir-boosted protease inhibitors. For the purpose of this analysis, treatment failure was defined as virological failure (confirmed HIV-1 RNA ≥50 copies/ml) or discontinuation of abacavir/lamivudine or tenofovir/emtricitabine because of adverse events, consent withdrawal, or lost to follow-up. There were 143 (72.59%) patients with tenofovir/emtricitabine and 54 (27.41%) with abacavir/lamivudine. In the raltegravir group, there were three (11.11%) treatment failures with abacavir/lamivudine and eight (10.96%) with tenofovir/emtricitabine (estimated difference 0.15%; 95% CI -17.90 to 11.6). In the ritonavir-boosted protease inhibitor group, there were four (14.81%) treatment failures with abacavir/lamivudine and 12 (17.14%) with tenofovir/emtricitabine (estimated difference -2.33%; 95% CI -16.10 to 16.70). Triglycerides decreased and HDL cholesterol increased through the study more pronouncedly with abacavir/lamivudine than with tenofovir/emtricitabine and differences in the total-to-HDL cholesterol ratio between both combinations of nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs) tended to be higher in the raltegravir group, although differences at 48 weeks were not significant. While no patient discontinued abacavir/lamivudine due to adverse events, four (2.80%) patients (all in the ritonavir-boosted protease inhibitor group) discontinued tenofovir/emtricitabine because of adverse events (p=0.2744). The results of this analysis do not suggest that outcomes of abacavir/lamivudine are worse than those of tenofovir/emtricitabine when combined with raltegravir in virologically suppressed HIV-infected adults

Biozones of Patagonia (Argentina)

We present a classification of Patagonian ecosystems based on functional attributes derived from the seasonal curves of Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), calculated from spectral data provided by the NOAA/AVHRR satellites. The attributes used were the annual integral, the relative range of NDVI, and the date of maximum NOW. These attributes capture critical aspects of the seasonal dynamics of carbon gains and allow for a good description of the spatial heterogeneity of ecosystem function in temperate areas. Our analysis defined 12 biozones that capture current ecosystem functioning. The units defined showed a good agreement with previously defined phytogeographical provinces. Mapping biozones based on attributes derived from satellite data does not require assumptions on the relationship between vegetation units and environmental features. This reduces the errors associated to the lack of correlation between the vegetation and environmental features