Alliance entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial orientation: the mediating effect of knowledge transfer

Today’s rapidly changing business environment has impelled companies to cooperate with their competitors gaining more competitive advantages by achieving win-win situation. Thereby, building alliances as one of the cooperative strategies has been adopted by many enterprises, consequently attracting great attention of numerous scholars. Nevertheless, the alliance literature seems to lack studies in the domain of entrepreneurship. Accordingly, this paper aims to extend entrepreneurship into the field of alliances highlighting two phenomenal concepts: alliance entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial orientation. Hence, the relationship between these two constructs together with the mediating role of knowledge transfer between alliance partners are investigated. We used Structural Equation Modeling with Partial Least Squares (PLS-SEM) technique under two sections of measurement model and structural model assessment in order to analyze data. The results gathered from Iran’s automotive industry confirmed the positive significant impact of alliance entrepreneurship on partners’ entrepreneurial orientation and the mediating effect of knowledge transfe

Towards a survival capabilities framework: lessons from the Portuguese Textile and Clothing industry

[Excerpt] Influenced dramatically by the financial crisis and the European sovereign debt crisis, many European industries are now struggling with the new international division of labour that compels the shift of manufacturing to lower labour cost countries. These decisive global challenges underline the need to investigate why some firms can survive such crises while many others fail. Grounded in this narrative, ‘survival’ can be regarded as a period of the firm’s growth and change over time, where it faces a crisis and stiff competition. This view is different from the one that defines the concept of ‘business survival’ as the second stage of the firm’s lifespan, after birth and before success, where it has obtained certain customers having their demanded products or services delivered (Lewis & Churchill, 1983).[...]Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), COMPETE, QREN, PT2020, FEDERinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A Delphi study of business models for cycling urban mobility platforms

The movement towards sustainable and liveable cities is gaining momentum and is projected to continue to shape the future of cities. Bicycles are one of the fastest-growing transportation modes that can contribute to more sustainable and smart urban mobility. New digital service platforms will likely arise to support an enhanced cycling mobility experience while also offering value to other stakeholders of a connected urban mobility ecosystem. Exploring suitable business models is critical to sustaining digital urban mobility platforms, but approaches that consider multiple stakeholders are scarce in previous research. Aiming to reduce this gap, this Delphi research with experienced professionals and academics adopts an ecosystem approach and explores two important components of business models for future cycling urban mobility platform services and the data they would generate: value propositions and value capture models. Results show that experts participating in the study generally agree on the potential attractiveness of the services of such a platform and mobility data for the studied stakeholders. However, lower and diverging estimates regarding the expected willingness to pay suggest that a business model that combines revenues from platform services and data services may be needed and that cross-subsidisation of some stakeholders could be necessary.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A value-based approach to business model innovation: defining the elements of the concept

Business model innovation (BMI) has increasingly attracted attention by proposing the business model (BM) as a new unit of analysis in the study of innovation. However, the definition and dimensioning of the concept is still unclear. This paper thereby aims to identify a consistent set of interdependent BMI elements, aligning with a configurational approach. Taking a value-based perspective, we review the existing contributions to date and arrive at five elements of BMI, each focused on one facet of the company’s BM: (1) value creation innovation; (2) value proposition innovation; (3) value delivery innovation; (4) value capture innovation; and (5) value network innovation. This study contributes to the growing BMI literature by proposing a unique classification underpinned by a value-grounded theory of the firm. Furthermore, we describe how these five dimensions interact and explore its implications. Throughout, we illustrate our ideas with the examples of existing companies.Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), COMPETE, QREN, PT2020, FEDERinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Behaviour Investigation of Sma-Equipped Bar Hysteretic Dampers Using Machine Learning Techniques

Most isolators have numerous displacements due to their low stiffness and damping properties. Accordingly, the supplementary damping systems have vital roles in damping enhancement and lower the isolation system displacement. Nevertheless, in many cases, even by utilising additional dampers in isolation systems, the occurrence of residual displacement is inevitable. To address this issue, in this study, a new smart type of bar hysteretic dampers equipped with shape memory alloy (SMA) bars with recentring features, as the supplementary damper, is introduced and investigated. In this regard, 630 numerical models of SMA-equipped bar hysteretic dampers (SMA-BHDs) were constructed based on experimental samples with different lengths, numbers, and cross sections of SMA bars. Furthermore, by utilising hysteresis curves and the corresponding ideal bilinear curves, the role of geometrical and mechanical parameters in the cyclic behaviour of SMA-BHDs was examined. Due to the deficiency of existing analytical models, proposed previously for steel bar hysteretic dampers (SBHDs), to estimate the first yield point displacement and post-yield stiffness ratio in SMA-BHDs accurately, new models were developed by the artificial neural network (ANN) and group method of data handling (GMDH) approaches. The results showed that, although the ANN models outperform GMDH ones, both ANN-and GMDH-based models can accurately estimate the linear and nonlinear behaviour of SMA-BHDs in pre-and post-yield parts with low errors and high accuracy and consistency

Health System Responsiveness: A Case Study of General Hospitals in Iran

Background : Considering patients’ needs and expectations in the process of healthcare delivery improves the quality of services. This study aimed to investigate the responsiveness of general public and private hospitals in Mashhad, Iran. Methods : In this cross-sectional and explanatory study, hospitalized patients (with at least 2 days of stay) in general private and public hospitals in Mashhad were investigated. In total 425 patients (259 from private and 166 from public hospitals) were selected using a stratified and simple random sampling. Standard responsiveness questionnaire was used as the data collection tool. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics, independent t-tests and ANOVA by SPSS 16 at a significance level of 0.05. Results : Access to the social support during hospitalization as well as confidentiality of the patient’s information achieved the highest score (3.21±0.73) while the patient participation in decision-making process of treatment received the least score (2.34±1.24). Among the research population 1.6%, 4.1%, 17.6%, 63.3% and 13.2% commented on the responsiveness level as very low, low, moderate, good, and excellent, respectively. There was no significant difference between the overall responsiveness scores of public and private hospitals ( P ≥0.05). Conclusion : The hospitals have enough potential to improve various aspects of their responsiveness. We suggest a number of measures can help improve the non-clinical aspects of care. These include: using educational courses to improve the knowledge and attitudes of medical and nonmedical staff, changing the resource allocation method, and using quality tools such as reengineering to modify the healthcare delivery processes

Overall Survival by Response to First-line Induction Treatment with Atezolizumab plus Platinum-based Chemotherapy or Placebo plus Platinum-based Chemotherapy for Metastatic Urothelial Carcinoma

Standard-of-care first-line treatment for metastatic urothelial carcinoma (mUC) is platinum-based chemotherapy (CTx). Maintenance immunotherapy is a treatment option for patients without progressive disease (PD) after induction CTx. IMvigor130 was a randomised, phase 3 study evaluating atezolizumab plus platinum-based CTx (arm A), atezolizumab monotherapy (arm B), or placebo plus platinum-based CTx (arm C) as first-line treatment for mUC. The primary progression-free survival (PFS) analysis showed a statistically significant PFS benefit favouring arm A versus arm C, which did not translate into overall survival (OS) benefit at the final OS analysis. We report exploratory analyses based on response to combination induction treatment (arm A vs arm C) using final OS data. Post-induction OS was analysed for patients without PD during induction (4-6 CTx cycles) who received at least one dose of single-agent atezolizumab/placebo maintenance treatment. Post-progression OS was analysed for patients with PD during induction CTx. Addition of atezolizumab to CTx did not impact OS outcomes, regardless of response to induction CTx, with hazard ratios of 0.84 (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.63-1.10) for patients without PD and 0.75 (95% CI 0.54-1.05) for those with PD during induction CTx. Treatment effects appeared to be greatest for patients treated with cisplatin and for those with PD-L1-high tumours. Patient summary: The IMvigor130 trial showed that addition of atezolizumab to chemotherapy (CTx) did not improve survival over CTx alone in patients with bladder cancer. Overall, patients whose cancer did not progress during initial treatment tended to live longer than patients whose cancer did progress, but addition of atezolizumab to CTx did not help either group live longer in comparison to CTx alone. However, the results suggest that patients who received a certain CTx drug (cisplatin) or who had high levels of a marker called PD-L1 in their tumour may get the most improvement from addition of atezolizumab to CTx. The IMvigor130 trial is registered on ClinicalTrials.gov as NCT02807636. (c) 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of European Association of Urology. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

Cabozantinib Versus Mitoxantrone-prednisone in Symptomatic Metastatic Castration-resistant Prostate Cancer: A Randomized Phase 3 Trial with a Primary Pain Endpoint

Background: Bone metastases in patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) are associated with debilitating pain and functional compromise. Objective: To compare pain palliation as the primary endpoint for cabozantinib versus mitoxantrone-prednisone in men with mCRPC and symptomatic bone metastases using patient-reported outcome measures. Design, setting, and participants: A randomized, double-blind phase 3 trial (COMET-2; NCT01522443) in men with mCRPC and narcotic-dependent pain from bone metastases who had progressed after treatment with docetaxel and either abiraterone or enzalutamide. Intervention: Cabozantinib 60 mg once daily orally versus mitoxantrone 12 mg/m2 every 3 wk plus prednisone 5 mg twice daily orally. Outcome measurements and statistical analysis: The primary endpoint was pain response at week 6 confirmed at week 12 (≥30% decrease from baseline in patient-reported average daily worst pain score via the Brief Pain Inventory without increased narcotic use). The planned sample size was 246 to achieve ≥90% power. Results and limitations: Enrollment was terminated early because cabozantinib did not demonstrate any survival benefit in the companion COMET-1 trial. At study closure, 119 participants were randomized (cabozantinib: N =61; mitoxantrone-prednisone: N = 58). Complete pain and narcotic use data were available at baseline, week 6, and week 12 for 73/106 (69%) patients. There was no significant difference in the pain response with cabozantinib versus mitoxantrone-prednisone: the proportions of responders were 15%versus 17%,a −2%difference(95%confidenceinterval:−16%to11%, p = 0.8). Barriers to accrual included pretreatment requirements for a washout period of prior anticancer therapy and a narcotic optimization period to maximize analgesic dosing. Conclusions: Cabozantinib treatment did not demonstrate better pain palliation than mitoxantrone-prednisone in heavily pretreated patients with mCRPC and symptomatic bone metastases. Future pain-palliation trials should incorporate briefer timelines from enrollment to treatment initiation. Patient summary: Cabozantinib was not better than mitoxantrone-prednisone for pain relief in patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer and debilitating pain from bone metastases