Strategies or Routines ? Knowledge Codification, Path-Dependence and the Evolution of Post-Acquisition Integration Practices in the U.S. Banking Industry

In a study of post-acquisition management practices in the U.S. commercial banking industry, we examine how firms codify their knowledge from previous acquisition experiences and routinize their post-acquisition decisions. We find that firms with higher levels of knowledge codification tend to integrate their acquired units more and to replace the existing top management team with higher probability. Also, acquirers tend to replicate their integration and resource replacement decisions irrespective of variations in the resource characteristics of their targets, suggesting strong tacit routinization effects.

Light absorption spectra in oligothiophene molecules

Para el dictado de clases, se pueden utilizar diferentes herramientas que nos brindan las nuevas tecnologías; herramientas que nos están modificando los procesos de enseñanza-aprendizaje. Actualmente, hemos pasado de usar internet como una fuente de información a un recurso docente indispensable en el aula. Este artículo se fundamenta en brindar información sobre las herramientas de uso de plataforma web como recurso docente. Las plataformas son aplicables tanto a la enseñanza presencial como a distancia siendo un gran recurso didáctico que enriquece el proceso de enseñanza aprendizaje y facilita la evaluación continua del estudiante.Centro de Investigación en Lectura y Escritura (CILE

The Impact of Knowledge Codification, Experience Trajectories and Integration Strategies on the Performance of Corporate Acquisitions

This study addresses the following questions: (1) can organizations learn how to manage infrequent and heterogeneous tasks ? (2) If they can, then what are the mechanisms that might explain learning under these circumstances ?, and (3) what are the limitations under which these mechanisms operate ? A model based on explicit knowledge codification and tacit experience accumulation is submitted and tested using data from a sample of 183 acquisitions in the US banking industry. Measures of post-acquisition integration strategies and of pre-acquisition resource characteristics are included in the model. We find that tacit knowledge accumulation significantly impacts performance when the experiences are highly homogeneous, and that knowledge codification improves acquisition performance in the context of high post-acquisition integration, i.e. when the organizational challenge is particularly complex. Also, the level of integration between the two firms involved in the acquisition positively influences performance, while the replacement of top managers in the acquired firm impacts performance in a negative fashion. Implications are drawn for organizational learning theory and for a knowledge-based view of corporate acquisitions.

Motivation and the theory of the firm

This paper proposes to revisit the debate on the theory of the firm using motivation theory as the primary analytical tool.theory of the firm; motivation theory

Experience Spillovers across Corporate Development Activities

This study develops a theoretical explanation for the existence of positive, as well as negative, experience spillovers across corporate development activities. We suggest that the similarity in two activities influences both the sign and magnitude of experience spillovers. The argument is used to understand how alliance experience influences the performance of acquisitions in the US commercial banking industry. The empirical evidence indicates that the spillover effect of alliance experience on acquisition performance is a function of the decisions made in the post-acquisition phase regarding the level of integration and the replacement of top management. We also find a U-shaped relationship between alliance experience and acquisition performance, suggesting the presence of negative spillovers across corporate development activities at low experience levels.

A new insight into the oxidative mechanism of caffeine and related methylxanthines in aprotic medium: May caffeine be really considered as an antioxidant?

Background: Antioxidant properties have been recently suggested for caffeine that seems showing protective effects against damages caused by oxidative stress. In particular, a HO% scavenging activity has been ascribed to caffeine. Even if the oxidation of caffeine has been widely studied, the antioxidant mechanism is still far to be understood. Methods: The electrochemical behavior of caffeine, theobromine and theophylline was studied in aprotic medium by cyclic voltammetry and electrolysis in UV–vis cell; a computational analysis of the molecular structures based on the Density Functional Theory was performed; the reactivity of all substrates towards lead dioxide, superoxide and galvinoxyl radical was followed by UV–vis spectrophotometry. Results: Results supported the mono-electronic oxidation of the C4]C5 bond for all substrates at high oxidation potentials, the electron-transfer process leading to a radical cation or a neutral radical according to the starting methylxanthine N7-substituted (caffeine and theobromine) or N7-unsubstituted (theophylline), respectively. A different following chemical fate might be predicted for the radical cation or the neutral radical. No interaction was evidenced towards the tested reactive oxygen species. Conclusions: No reactivity via H-atom transfer was evidenced for all studied compounds, suggesting that an antiradical activity should be excluded. Some reactivity only with strong oxidants could be predicted via electron- transfer. The acclaimed HO% scavenging activity should be interpreted in these terms. The study suggested that CAF might be hardly considered an antioxidant. General significance: Beyond the experimental methods used, the discussion of the present results might provide food for thought to the wide audience working on antioxidants

Thermally-activated charge reversibility of gallium vacancies in GaAs

The dominant charge state for the Ga vacancy in GaAs has been the subject of a long debate, with experiments proposing $-$1, $-$2 or $-$3 as the best answer. We revisit this problem using {\it ab initio} calculations to compute the effects of temperature on the Gibbs free energy of formation, and we find that the thermal dependence of the Fermi level and of the ionization levels lead to a reversal of the preferred charge state as the temperature increases. Calculating the concentrations of gallium vacancies based on these results, we reproduce two conflicting experimental measurements, showing that these can be understood from a single set of coherent LDA results when thermal effects are included.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure