Partnerships vs. Firms Entry Strategies

From 1997 to 2001 we observe a faster growth in the number of Nonemployer businesses (mostly Partnerships) vis-à-vis Firms in the USA, a country with the mildest asymmetries between the two types of enterprise with respect to taxation, administrative entry barriers and other institutional aspects. The different speed of net entry may be due to the internal organisation of the two types of enterprise and its relation to some market features. In a continuous time stochastic environment, with sunk costs, we model entry as a growth option. Partnerships and Firms display speci…c entry patterns in terms of output price and size since they react in diverse fashions to market uncertainty. In most cases, the Partnership is less risky and better suited to enter under conditions of high volatility, as during the years between 1997 and 2001.Entry Strategies, Uncertainty, Partnership, Firm

Vertical Integration and Operational Flexibility

The main aim of the paper is to highlight the relation between flexibility and vertical integration. To this purpose, we go through the selection of the optimal degree of vertical disintegration of a flexible firm which operates in a dynamic uncertain environment. The enterprise we model enjoys flexibility since it can switch from a certain amount of disintegration to vertical integration and viceversa. This means that the firm never loses vertical control, i.e., the ability to produce all inputs even when it buys them in the market. This sort of flexibility makes for results which are somehow contrary to the Industrial Organization recent literature and closer to the Operations Research results. In this sense we provide a bridge between the two approaches and rescue Industrial Organization from counterintuitive conclusions.Vertical Integration, Outsourcing, Entry, Flexibility

Are Workers. Enterprises Entry Policies Conventional

One of the main reasons why workers’ enterprises (WE) still represent a relevant chunk of the economy may lie in some affinities with conventional profit maximizing firms. To prove this, we compare the entry policies of WEs and conventional firms when they can decide size at entry while having to stick to it afterwards. Even though short run differences remain, a long run coincidence appears besides that under certainty. Endogenizing size and time of entry in an uncertain dynamic environment we see that WEs enter at the same trigger and size of conventional firms. Both of them wait less and choose a dimension larger than the minimum efficient scale. This may be another way to explain why WE are still an important share of the economy (Hesse and Cihàk, 2007) despite the ongoing mantra of their imminent demise.Workers’ Enterprises, Entry, Uncertainty, Rigidity

Start-up Entry Strategies: Employer vs. Nonemployer firms

From 1997 to 2001 we observe in the Usa a faster growth in the number of Nonemployer firms (NF) vis à vis Employer firms (EF). The diverse speed of net entry may be due to particular internal organisation of the two types of firms and the effect that this has on the reactions to market uncertainty. However, the set of internal organizations of firms is larger than that made up simply by EFs and NFs, in particular among newborn firms, since we observe corporate start-ups with employees, firms owned and managed by their founders who are simultaneously the employees and, finally, non corporate enterprises. The second class of firms mostly belongs to the category of NFs, according to US nomenclature, while non corporate firms may belong to either category. Our curiosity is attracted by different entry patterns of NFs and EFs and our aim is to interpret them. According to recent literature, firms carry out an irreversible investment, such as entry, only if market prices are strictly larger than average total costs (Marshallian point). However, the trigger price that makes firms become active is affected by institutional rules, the existence of profit sharing, efficiency wages, exit options - i.e. partial reversibility -, financial constraints. Then, the internal organization of a newborn firm may make the difference. In a continuous time stochastic environment, where firms bear a sunk cost, we model entry as a growth option. On the trace of distinct objective functions we show that NFs and EFs have specific entry patterns in terms of output price and/or size. Why? Simply because they react in diverse fashions to market price volatility. In this sense we are able to show that, in most cases, the NF is locally less risky. This makes the NF better suited to enter under conditions of higher volatility. This exactly corresponds to what happened during the years between 1997-2001.Entry strategies, Uncertainty, Nonemployer, Employer firms

Vertical Integration and Operational Flexibility

The main aim of the paper is to highlight the relation between flexibility and vertical integration. To this purpose, we go through the selection of the optimal degree of vertical disintegration of a flexible firm which operates in a dynamic uncertain environment. The enterprise we model enjoys flexibility since it can switch from a certain amount of disintegration to vertical integration and viceversa. This means that the firm never loses vertical control, i.e., the ability to produce all inputs even when it buys them in the market. This sort of flexibility makes for results which are somehow contrary to the Industrial Organization recent literature and closer to the Operations Research results. In this sense we provide a bridge between the two approaches and rescue Industrial Organization from counterintuitive conclusions

Vertical flexibility, outsourcing and the financial choices of the firm

We investigate the relationship between the extent of vertical flexibility and the underlying financial choices of a firm. By vertical flexibility we mean the opportunity to outsource a necessary input and to reverse the choice as input market conditions dictate. A firm simultaneously selects the portion of equity and debt and its vertical setting. Debt is provided by a lender that requires the payment of a fixed coupon over time and, as a collateral, an option to buy out the firm in certain circumstances. Debt leads to the same level of flexibility acquired by an unlevered firm. However, investment to set up a flexible technology occurs earlier. An alternative to debt is the involvement of venture capital for the production of the input. We explore this second avenue finding that the extent of outsourcing adopted is lower than for the unlevered firm, but the firm invests earlier

Labour Participation in Different Firm Organisations

The main issue is the organisation of firms when different degrees of labour participation are taken into account. We start reviewing the literature on the LM firm. We then consider a less radical labour participation, i.e. the Aoki firm. We survey extensions of the Aoki's firm to the case of market uncertainty, where also the question of the optimal allocation of the shut down decision is tackled, when shareholders are not able to maximise the total payoff accruing to both workers and owners. By and large, it appears that the degree of labour participation in decisions and rent sharing in a firm is not a settled question, even though is seems to depend on the respective degree of firm specificities of production factors.Labour participation, Firm organisation

The Ising critical quantum Otto engine

We study a four-stroke Otto engine whose working fluid is a quantum Ising chain. The thermodynamic cycle consists in sweeps of the transverse magnetic field occurring in thermal isolation, alternated by thermalisation strokes with reservoirs at different temperatures. The system-environment coupling is modelled in a thermodynamically consistent way by means of a nonlocal Lindblad master equation. We show that the engine may operate in four different operation modes, depending on the various parameters, in particular it can act as a heat engine and as a refrigerator. We detect an enhancement of the thermodynamic performance as the critical point is crossed, and investigate it in detail

Genome sequencing reveals extraordinary cephalic horns in the Madagascan dung beetle genus Helictopleurus (Coleoptera, Scarabaeinae) : insight from a revision of fungicola species group

In this study, we test and corroborate the phylogenetic position of Heterosyphus within Helictopleurus using mitogenomes and nuclear loci. Our recent samplings revealed that males of the former Heterosyphus sicardi Paulian, 1975 (today under Helictopleurus d'Orbigny, 1915) have extraordinary bilateral clypeal horns which are exclusive within the genus. We provide a taxonomic review of the fungicola species group of Helictopleurus and discuss the systematic position of H. sicardi within the group. The male phenotype of H. sicardi is described and photographs of the body and genitalia of the members of the fungicola group are given, as well as a diagnostic key to species of the group. Helictopleurus fungicola peyrierasi is considered to be a distinct species within the genus (H. peyrierasi stat. rest.). Helictopleurus pluristriatus d'Orbigny, 1915 syn. nov. is established as a junior synonym of H. fungicola (Fairmaire, 1899).Peer reviewe

Onthophagus pilauco sp. nov. (Coleoptera, Scarabaeidae): evidence of beetle extinction in the Pleistocene–Holocene transition in Chilean Northern Patagonia

The South American Pleistocene–Holocene transition has been characterized by drastic climatic and diversity changes. These rapid changes induced one of the largest and most recent extinctions in the megafauna at the continental scale. However, examples of the extinction of small animals (e.g., insects) are scarce, and the underlying causes of the extinction have been little studied. In this work, a new extinct dung beetle species is described from a late Pleistocene sequence (~15.2 k cal yr BP) at the paleoarcheological site Pilauco, Chilean Northern Patagonia. Based on morphological characters, this fossil is considered to belong to the genus Onthophagus Latreille, 1802 and named Onthophagus pilauco sp. nov. We carried out a comprehensive revision of related groups, and we analyzed the possible mechanism of diversification and extinction of this new species. We hypothesize that Onthophagus pilauco sp. nov. diversified as a member of the osculatii species-complex following migration processes related to the Great American Biotic Interchange (~3 Ma). The extinction of O. pilauco sp. nov. may be related to massive defaunation and climatic changes recorded in the Plesitocene-Holocene transition (12.8 k cal yr BP). This finding is the first record of this genus in Chile, and provides new evidence to support the collateral-extinction hypothesis related to the defaunation.FT was supported by CONICYT doctoral scholarship Grant #21171980 and Ilustre Municipalidad de Osorno, Osorno, Chile