Consumer perceptions of co-branding alliances: Organizational dissimilarity signals and brand fit

This study explores how consumers evaluate co-branding alliances between dissimilar partner firms. Customers are well aware that different firms are behind a co-branded product and observe the partner firms’ characteristics. Drawing on signaling theory, we assert that consumers use organizational characteristics as signals in their assessment of brand fit and for their purchasing decisions. Some organizational signals are beyond the control of the co-branding partners or at least they cannot alter them on short notice. We use a quasi-experimental design and test how co-branding partner dissimilarity affects brand fit perception. The results show that co-branding partner dissimilarity in terms of firm size, industry scope, and country-of-origin image negatively affects brand fit perception. Firm age dissimilarity does not exert significant influence. Because brand fit generally fosters a benevolent consumer attitude towards a co-branding alliance, the findings suggest that high partner dissimilarity may reduce overall co-branding alliance performance

Politizando o conceito de redes organizacionais: uma reflexão teórica da governança como jogo de poder

Este trabalho tem como objetivo apresentar uma reflexão teórica sobre a dimensão política das redes organizacionais. Para tanto, procurou fazer uma análise desse formato organizacional, privilegiando a dimensão política das relações interorganizacionais a partir de alguns conceitos formulados pelo sociólogo Pierre Bourdieu. As evidências teóricas revelaram que esse recorte analítico poderá oferecer leituras alternativas às reflexões que despolitizam o conceito de redes organizacionais, colocando no epicentro das argumentações a lógica da cooperação e da confiança como forças motrizes e suficientes para explicar o funcionamento das relações entre as organizações. Ao considerar as redes organizacionais como um campo social, este ensaio amplia a noção de governança, levando em consideração não só os aspectos estruturais e objetivos, mas também a dimensão subjetiva que permeia as relações entre os agentes

Neurobiol Aging

GRN mutations are frequent causes of familial frontotemporal degeneration. Although there is no clear consensual threshold, plasma progranulin levels represent an efficient biomarker for predicting GRN mutations when decreased. We evaluated plasma levels to determine whether it could also predict age at onset, clinical phenotype, or disease progression in 160 GRN carriers. Importantly, progranulin levels were influenced by gender, with lower levels in male than in female patients in our study. Although we found no correlation with age at onset or with clinical phenotype, we confirmed that decreased level predicts GRN mutations, even in presymptomatic carriers more than four decades before disease onset. We also provided first evidence for the stability of levels throughout longitudinal trajectory in carriers, over a 4-year time span. Finally, we confirmed that progranulin levels constitute a reliable, cost-effective marker, suitable as a screening tool in patients with familial frontotemporal degeneration, and more broadly in patients without family history or with atypical presentations who are less likely to be referred for molecular diagnosis

Coordination Efficiency: Proposals for a Framework. An Illustration with the Fresh Tomato Sector in France

International audienceThe study of vertical coordination in agribusiness has benefited greatly from the field of new institutional economics. Concepts and categories enable researchers to better understand the diversity and complexity of vertical institutional arrangements. Nevertheless, many questions remain unsolved. One of them is the coexistence of very heterogeneous and dissemblable arrangements in the same sector. This question is a way to highlight the question of coordination efficiency. What are the thought processes — and therefore the tools — useful to analyze, compare and assess different coordination mechanisms ? Or, to put it in an other perspective, is it possible to assess coordination efficiency with a simple and unified framework

Organizational Issues in the Agrifood Sector: Toward a Comparative Approach

Includes bibliographical references.This article outlines a research program comparing the economic organization of agriculture in the United States and European Union (EU). While both have highly developed agricultural sectors, there is substantial variation in organizational arrangements between and within the two. History and path dependence explain some of this variety, but other local conditions are important as well