Enhancing Innovativeness:The Role of Dynamic Marketing Capabilities

The gap between the relatively static marketing resources of a firm and the turbulent marketplace is growing in importance for both practitioners and academics alike. This paper explores how marketing capabilities, specifically market orientation, work synergistically with other organizational capabilities to form dynamic marketing capabilities that enhance firm innovativeness. Findings indicate that a tight integration between the technical and marketing functions of a firm creates a fertile transformation point, where market orientation infuses the innovation process. Market orientation interacts with these integrated capabilities to form a dynamic marketing capability that enhances the organization\u27s innovativeness. Implications include how these dynamic marketing capabilities differ between service and manufacturing firms, where only the cultural aspects of market orientation enhance performance in service firms

Firm-Specific Assets, Multinationality, and Financial Performance: A Meta-Analytic Review and Theoretical Integration

Through a meta-analysis of 120 independent samples reported in 111 studies, we test the predictions of internalization theory in the context of the multinationality-performance relationship. Findings indicate that multinationality provides an efficient organizational form that enables firms to transfer their firm-specific assets to generate higher returns in international markets. In addition, the results delineate the conditions under which firm-specific assets have the strongest impact on the multinationality-performance relationship. Meta-analytic evidence also suggests that multinationality has intrinsic value above and beyond the intangible assets that firms possess, given analyses controlling for firms\u27 international experience, age, size, and product diversification

Unparticle Searches Through Compton Scattering

We investigate the effects of unparticles on Compton scattering, e gamma -> e gamma based on a future e^+e^- linear collider such as the CLIC. For different polarization configurations, we calculate the lower limits of the unparticle energy scale Lambda_U for a discovery reach at the center of mass energies sqrt(s)=0.5 TeV- 3 TeV. It is shown that, especially, for smaller values of the mass dimension d, (1 <d <1.3), and for high energies and luminosities of the collider these bounds are very significant. As a stringent limit, we find Lambda_U>80 TeV for d<1.3 at sqrt(s)=3 TeV, and 1 ab^(-1) integrated luminosity per year, which is comparable with the limits calculated from other low and high energy physics implications.Comment: Table 1 and 2 have been combined as Table 1, references updated, minor typos have been correcte

A922 Sequential measurement of 1 hour creatinine clearance (1-CRCL) in critically ill patients at risk of acute kidney injury (AKI)

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The peatland map of Europe

Based on the ‘European Mires Book’ of the International Mire Conservation Group (IMCG), this article provides a composite map of national datasets as the first comprehensive peatland map for the whole of Europe. We also present estimates of the extent of peatlands and mires in each European country individually and for the entire continent. A minimum peat thickness criterion has not been strictly applied, to allow for (often historically determined) country-specific definitions. Our ‘peatland’ concept includes all ‘mires’, which are peatlands where peat is being formed. The map was constructed by merging national datasets in GIS while maintaining the mapping scales of the original input data. This ‘bottom-up’ approach indicates that the overall area of peatland in Europe is 593,727 km². Mires were found to cover more than 320,000 km² (around 54 % of the total peatland area). If shallow-peat lands (< 30 cm peat) in European Russia are also taken into account, the total peatland area in Europe is more than 1,000,000 km2, which is almost 10 % of the total surface area. Composite inventories of national peatland information, as presented here for Europe, may serve to identify gaps and priority areas for field survey, and help to cross-check and calibrate remote sensing based mapping approaches

Cultural Distance and Firm Internationalization:A Meta-Analytical Review and Theoretical Implications

This paper presents the most comprehensive review and meta-analysis of the literature on cultural distance and firm internationalization to date. We analyze the effects of cultural distance on key strategic decisions throughout the entire process of internationalization. For the preinvestment stage, we examine the decisions on where to invest (location choice), how much to invest (degree of ownership), and how to organize the foreign expansion (entry and establishment mode). For the postinvestment stage, we examine the decisions of how to integrate the foreign subsidiary into the organization (transfer of practices) as well as the performance effects of cultural distance at both the subsidiary and the firm level. We find that firms are less likely to expand to culturally distant locations but if they do, they prefer greenfield investments and integrate subsidiaries more through transfer of management practices. Cultural distance does not seem to affect how much capital firms invest and whether they enter through a joint venture or full ownership. Interestingly, cultural distance has a strong negative effect on subsidiary performance but no effect on the performance of the whole multinational company. In addition, we find that the effects of cultural distance are not sensitive to time, but they are sensitive to the cultural framework used (e.g., Hofstede vs. Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness) and the home country of the company (developed vs. emerging market). Based on our study, we feel confident to offer some theoretical insights, recommendations for improving the validity and reliability of cultural-distance research, and ideas for future research

Nitric oxide synthetic pathway and cGMP levels are altered in red blood cells from end-stage renal disease patients

Red blood cells (RBCs) enzymatically produce nitric oxide (NO) by a functional RBC-nitric oxide synthase (RBC-NOS). NO is a vascular key regulatory molecule. In RBCs its generation is complex and influenced by several factors, including insulin, acetylcholine, and calcium. NO availability is reduced in end-stage renal disease (ESRD) and associated with endothelial dysfunction. We previously demonstrated that, through increased phosphatidylserine membrane exposure, ESRD-RBCs augmented their adhesion to human cultured endothelium, in which NO bioavailability decreased. Since RBC-NOS-dependent NO production in ESRD is unknown, this study aimed to investigate RBC-NOS levels/activation, NO production/bioavailability in RBCs from healthy control subjects (C, N = 18) and ESRD patients (N = 27). Although RBC-NOS expression was lower in ESRD-RBCs, NO, cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP), RBC-NOS Serine1177 phosphorylation level and eNOS/Calmodulin (CaM)/Heat Shock Protein-90 (HSP90) interaction levels were higher in ESRD-RBCs, indicating increased enzyme activation. Conversely, following RBCs stimulation with insulin or ionomycin, NO and cGMP levels were significantly lower in ESRD- than in C-RBCs, suggesting that uremia might reduce the RBC-NOS response to further stimuli. Additionally, the activity of multidrug-resistance-associated protein-4 (MRP4; cGMP-membrane transporter) was significantly lower in ESRD-RBCs, suggesting a possible compromised efflux of cGMP across the ESRD-RBCs membrane. This study for the first time showed highest basal RBC-NOS activation in ESRD-RBCs, possibly to reduce the negative impact of decreased NOS expression. It is further conceivable that high NO production only partially affects cell function of ESRD-RBCs maybe because in vivo they are unable to respond to physiologic stimuli, such as calcium and/or insulin