A Survey Of New Product Development: Can Decentralization Alone Deliver?

Geographic decentralization of the new product development (NPD) process is seen by many as a necessary means to increase innovation and its cost-effectiveness.  Decentralization promotes innovation in many ways, especially by allowing better access to local knowledge pools.  This study's results, based on a survey of top executives in large manufacturing firms around the globe, give only mixed support to this view.  Decentralization is associated with increases in revenues from new product but the performance of firms with geographically decentralized NPD is inferior otherwise.  The key culprits seem to be the decrease in involvement of NPD stakeholders in firms with geographically decentralized NPD and the inability of firms with geographically decentralized NPD to generate a greater level of radical innovations. The study results are broadly consistent with academic research in this area

Knowledge Accumulation and Dissemination in MNEs: A Practice-Based Framework

Much has been written on the importance of knowledge accumulation and transfer within the network firm but two questions remain. First, what are the specifics of this process, particularly for high tacit content knowledge? Second, how can firms create a sustainable competitive advantage from knowledge acquired from outside the firm? We address the first question by proposing that the mechanisms of external knowledge capture and internal knowledge transfer can best be understood and studied not at the level of networked subsidiary firms, but at the micro-organizational level of Communities of Practice (CoPs). We then offer a model of the dynamics of organizational learning in network organizations, such as MNEs, which builds on this unit of analysis. This framework clarifies the link between CoPs and Networks of Practice (NoPs), by offering a novel conceptual model of how knowledge, particularly tacit, embedded knowledge, is absorbed. The framework also proposes a new link - that between CoPs and Internal Networks of Practice (INoPs), as another essential ingredient to knowledge accumulation and transfer within firms. We also propose that the firm-level architectural knowledge that is developed through INoPs is valuable and rare. In combination with the component knowledge that is developed through NoPs, architectural knowledge can create novel knowledge that may be a source of competitive advantage

Distributed Learning Dynamics for Coalitional Games

In the framework of transferable utility coalitional games, a scoring (characteristic) function determines the value of any subset/coalition of agents. Agents decide on both which coalitions to form and the allocations of the values of the formed coalitions among their members. An important concept in coalitional games is that of a core solution, which is a partitioning of agents into coalitions and an associated allocation to each agent under which no group of agents can get a higher allocation by forming an alternative coalition. We present distributed learning dynamics for coalitional games that converge to a core solution whenever one exists. In these dynamics, an agent maintains a state consisting of (i) an aspiration level for its allocation and (ii) the coalition, if any, to which it belongs. In each stage, a randomly activated agent proposes to form a new coalition and changes its aspiration based on the success or failure of its proposal. The coalition membership structure is changed, accordingly, whenever the proposal succeeds. Required communications are that: (i) agents in the proposed new coalition need to reveal their current aspirations to the proposing agent, and (ii) agents are informed if they are joining the proposed coalition or if their existing coalition is broken. The proposing agent computes the feasibility of forming the coalition. We show that the dynamics hit an absorbing state whenever a core solution is reached. We further illustrate the distributed learning dynamics on a multi-agent task allocation setting.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures; accepted for CDC 202

Stereoelectronic effects on the binding of neutral Lewis bases to CdSe nanocrystals

Using P-31 nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, we monitor the competition between tri-nbutylphosphine (Bu3P) and various amine and phosphine ligands for the surface of chloride terminated CdSe nanocrystals. Distinct P-31 NMR signals for free and bound phosphine ligands allow the surface ligand coverage to be measured in phosphine solution. Ligands with a small steric profile achieve higher surface coverages (Bu3P = 0.5 nm(-2), Me2P-n-octyl = 2.0 nm(-2), NH2Bu = >3 nm(-2)) and have greater relative binding affinity for the nanocrystal (binding affinity: Me3P > Me2P -n-octyl similar to Me2P -n-octadecyl > Et3P > Bu3P). Among phosphines, only Bu 3 P and Me2P-n-octyl support a colloidal dispersion, allowing a relative surface binding affinity (K-rel) to be estimated in that case (K-rel = 3.1). The affinity of the amine ligands is measured by the extent to which they displace Bu3P from the nanocrystals (K-rel: H2NBu similar to N-n-butylimidazole > 4-ethylpyridine > Bu3P similar to HNBu2 > Me2NBu > Bu3N). The affinity for the CdSe surface is greatest among soft, basic donors and depends on the number of each ligand that bind. Sterically unencumbered ligands such as imidazole, pyridine, and n-alkylamines can therefore outcompete stronger donors such as alkylphosphines. The influence of repulsive interactions between ligands on the binding affinity is a consequence of the high atom density of binary semiconductor surfaces. The observed behavior is distinct from the self-assembly of straight-chain surfactants on gold and silver where the ligands are commensurate with the underlying lattice and attractive interactions between aliphatic chains strengthen the binding

Constraints on the origin of the ultra-high energy cosmic-rays using cosmic diffuse neutrino flux limits: An analytical approach

Astrophysical neutrinos are expected to be produced in the interactions of ultra-high energy cosmic-rays with surrounding photons. The fluxes of the astrophysical neutrinos are highly dependent on the characteristics of the cosmic-ray sources, such as their cosmological distributions. We study possible constraints on the properties of cosmic-ray sources in a model-independent way using experimentally obtained diffuse neutrino flux above 100 PeV. The semi-analytic formula is derived to estimate the cosmogenic neutrino fluxes as functions of source evolution parameter and source extension in redshift. The obtained formula converts the upper-limits on the neutrino fluxes into the constraints on the cosmic-ray sources. It is found that the recently obtained upper-limit on the cosmogenic neutrinos by IceCube constrains the scenarios with strongly evolving ultra-high energy cosmic-ray sources, and the future limits from an 1 km^3 scale detector are able to further constrain the ultra-high energy cosmic-rays sources with evolutions comparable to the cosmic star formation rate.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures and 1 table. Accepted by Phys. Rev.

Research Note On The Incremental Value Of Knowledge Workers

As firms seek to manage knowledge, they rely increasingly on knowledge workers. The assumption is often that the incremental value from hiring these knowledge workers accrues to firms, but theory indicates that it may not. In this research note, we examine this question.  We perform a cross-sectional study of 30 investment banks in the period 1992-96.  We use gross value of mergers and acquisitions business as a proxy for gross performance, and pre-tax operating income as a proxy for net performance.  The dependent variable and measure of knowledge workers is the number of “star” analysts, as measured by Wall Street Journal/Zacks rankings.  Our results strongly support the hypothesis that the number of star analysts in investment banking is positively associated with gross performance, and weakly support the hypothesis that they are not positively associated with net performance. If future research could generalize these conclusions, they could have implications for design of compensation systems in industries significantly employing knowledge workers