What is the Future of Strategic Management?

The history of planning and creating strategies has a past of over half a century. Throughout this lifetime period we have witnessed both the evolution of theory and practice. The MBA study books in the last-third of the 20th century have with predilection exhibited this very process as a complex of monetary centered budget planning, forecast-based planning, strategic planning and strategic management. There might be a controversy existing about the naming, characteristics and timing of these different sections but there is an accordance that the changes that we have taken place in the last decade as a whole without a doubt can be derived from these very changes in the business environment or in some outstanding cases (like 9/11) they can be acknowledged as the ability of corporate foreseeing and the ability to adapt to the vision of the future. The main purposes of the research is to provide a summarized picture about the changing process of this procedure during last decades as far as the planning and creating strategies are concerned and also their milestones and periods. Try to explore and systemize the very aspects of these changes. The happenings of the first decade of the new millennium are outstandingly interesting if we consider their real effect on the theory and practice of strategic management. Let us remember the euphoria around the year 2000, the predictions of „new technologies”, „new economy”, „new organization” and „new leadership”. We have implied before on the destruction of the twin towers of the World Trade Center which meant a new era, a new quality of international terrorism and its consequences (Afghanistan, Iraq). But the „product” of this decade is the strategic aim that companies focus on, which is the social responsibility regarding the unavoidance of the effects of climate change on the long run. During the research the big question has risen concerning how did the science of strategic management do as far as the predictions of the global monetary and economic crisis are concerned? And also its solutions this very science has to offer in order to handle and get over the crisis. Does it conclude from the answers given to the questions that a change in paradigms are necessary, a new quality is needed or may be we have come to a new crossroad of the development process that will take over strategic management? (...

The flow of two falling balls mixes rapidly

In this paper we study the system of two falling balls in continuous time. We modell the system by a suspension flow over a two dimensional, hyperbolic base map. By detailed analysis of the geometry of the system we identify special periodic points and show that the ratio of certain periods in continuous time is Diophantine for almost every value of the mass parameter in an interval. Using results of Melbourne (\cite{M}) and our previous achievements \cite{BBNV} we conclude that for these values of the parameter the flow mixes faster than any polynomial. Even though the calculations are presented for the specific physical system, the method is quite general and can be applied to other suspension flows, too

Confidence intervals for the critical value in the divide and color model

We obtain confidence intervals for the location of the percolation phase transition in H\"aggstr\"om's divide and color model on the square lattice $\mathbb{Z}^2$ and the hexagonal lattice $\mathbb{H}$. The resulting probabilistic bounds are much tighter than the best deterministic bounds up to date; they give a clear picture of the behavior of the DaC models on $\mathbb{Z}^2$ and $\mathbb{H}$ and enable a comparison with the triangular lattice $\mathbb{T}$. In particular, our numerical results suggest similarities between DaC model on these three lattices that are in line with universality considerations, but with a remarkable difference: while the critical value function $r_c(p)$ is known to be constant in the parameter $p$ for $p<p_c$ on $\mathbb{T}$ and appears to be linear on $\mathbb{Z}^2$, it is almost certainly non-linear on $\mathbb{H}$

Operator splitting for nonautonomous delay equations

We provide a general product formula for the solution of nonautonomous abstract delay equations. After having shown the convergence we obtain estimates on the order of convergence for differentiable history functions. Finally, the theoretical results are demonstrated on some typical numerical examples.Comment: to appear in "Computers & Mathematics with Applications (CAMWA)

Operator splitting for dissipative delay equations

We investigate Lie-Trotter product formulae for abstract nonlinear evolution equations with delay. Using results from the theory of nonlinear contraction semigroups in Hilbert spaces, we explain the convergence of the splitting procedure. The order of convergence is also investigated in detail, and some numerical illustrations are presented.Comment: to appear in Semigroup Foru

Gibbsianness and non-Gibbsianness in divide and color models

For parameters $p\in[0,1]$ and $q>0$ such that the Fortuin--Kasteleyn (FK) random-cluster measure $\Phi_{p,q}^{\mathbb{Z}^d}$ for $\mathbb{Z}^d$ with parameters $p$ and $q$ is unique, the $q$-divide and color [$\operatorname {DaC}(q)$] model on $\mathbb{Z}^d$ is defined as follows. First, we draw a bond configuration with distribution $\Phi_{p,q}^{\mathbb{Z}^d}$. Then, to each (FK) cluster (i.e., to every vertex in the FK cluster), independently for different FK clusters, we assign a spin value from the set $\{1,2,\...,s\}$ in such a way that spin $i$ has probability $a_i$. In this paper, we prove that the resulting measure on spin configurations is a Gibbs measure for small values of $p$ and is not a Gibbs measure for large $p$, except in the special case of $q\in \{2,3,\...\}$, $a_1=a_2=\...=a_s=1/q$, when the $\operatorname {DaC}(q)$ model coincides with the $q$-state Potts model.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/09-AOP518 the Annals of Probability (http://www.imstat.org/aop/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

Marker alapú szelekciós rendszer kidolgozása humántáplálkozás szempontjából kedvezőbb mikroelem-összetételű gabonafélék nemesítéséhez asszociációs térképezés segítségével = Development of a marker assisted selection system for breeding cereals with better nutritional value using association mapping

Munkánk során egy búza- és egy árpa fajtagyűjteményen vizsgáltuk a szemtermés mikroelemtartalmak változását. A búzán három, az árpán négy független ismétlésben elvégzett tesztek segítségével sikerült mindkét fajnál olyan genotípusokat azonosítani, melyek több környezetben is stabilan magas illetve alacsony elemtartalmakat mutattak. Ezek a genotípusok alkalmasak lehetnek olyan térképezési populációk létrehozására, mellyel a jelleget befolyásoló lókuszok nagyfelbontással azonosíthatók. A magas mikroelemösszetételő fajtákat közvetlenül fel lehet használni olyan vonalak előállításához, melyek kedvezőbb szemtermés mikroelemösszetételűek. Sikerült szemtermés mikroelemtartalmakat stabilan befolyásoló lókuszokat, és a lókuszokhoz kapcsolt DArT markereket is meghatározni. Ezen markerek felhasználásával a jelleg marker alapú szelekciója megvalósítható, azonban a nagy környezeti hatás miatt csak kismértékű javulást lehet elérni. A mikroelemtartalmak és a termésmennyiség között vagy nem volt kapcsolat, vagy kismértékű negatív korrelációt lehetett megfigyelni, ezért nem képzelhető el a mikroelemtartalom és termésmennyiség együttes fokozása. A különböző mikroelemek koncentrációja között pozitív irányú kapcsolat volt megfigyelhető, így az egyik mikroelem koncentrációjának növelése a többi mikroelem koncentrációjának a növekedését vonja maga után. Munkánk eredményét leginkább a zárt láncú – így alapvetően ökológiai gazdálkodású – rendszerben termesztett búza esetén lehet majd felhasználni. | This project was aimed to investigate the variability in grain micronutrient contents in wheat and barley variety collections. Using several independent replications barley and wheat varieties with outsanding high- and low grain nutrient contents were identified. These genotypes could be used for creating mapping populations to fine map the loci affecting these traits, and further, lines with favourable nutrient contents can be directly used by breeders to improve nutrient composition of breeding materials. Loci affecting grain nutrient contents under a range of environments and the linked DArT markers were also determined. Using these markers lines with better nutritional value might be selected, however, because of the existence of the huge environmental effect only a small improvement could be expected. Negative correlations were found between yield performance and grain micronutrient contents, therefore, an improvements in both trait is not expectable. Because of the positive correlations between the different grain micronutrient contents, an improvements in the contents of one nutrient will be resulted improvements in others as well. The results of the project might be utilized most possibly in organic farming systems

Foreign currency borrowing of households in new EU member states

The post-Lehman phase of the financial crisis has exposed a number of weaknesses in the banking sectors of the European Union’s New Member States (NMSs). One of these is the prevalence of lending in foreign currency. While banks themselves in these countries have not taken on sizeable currency risk directly, they passed it on to households and the corporate sector. With large depreciations taking place or looming in the region, the currency risk at households and corporates without a natural hedge is now being transformed into credit risk for the banking sector. This is creating a serious problem in maintaining financial stability and cripples monetary policy in countries where it operates primarily through the exchange rate channel. The patterns of foreign currency lending to households in NMSs vary widely both across countries and time periods. For example, FX lending to households is virtually non-existent in the Czech Republic while in some Baltic countries its share is close to 100 per cent of total household lending. The main goal of the paper is (1) to present the stylised facts of pre-crisis FX lending in NMSs systematically and (2) to try to explain these differing patterns in an econometric model. In order to do so, a panel database of household FX borrowing is compiled, covering 10 NMSs in the period 1999-2008. Our estimation results suggest that the degree of household FX borrowing depends on the interest rate differential, the institutional features of mortgage financing and the monetary regime. Household FX borrowing tends to be less prevalent if the interest rate differential is small, fixed interest rate mortgage financing is available and the monetary authority’s “fear of floating” is low.foreign currency lending, new member states, credit risk, monetary policy

Two Essays on Contemporary Music

Bálint András Varga (1941–2019) was an advocate for and a keen critic of contemporary music, first on radio, and later as an acquisitions editor for both Editio Hungarica and Universal-Edition. He interviewed many musical figures and planned to interview visual artists before he died. His interlocutors were impressed with Varga’s insightful questions and frequently answered them much more comprehensively than they would ones from standard journalists. These two essays were intended to be published in Varga’s third book, From Boulanger to Stockhausen: Interviews and a Memoir. The first, “What to Listen for in Music,” refers to Aaron Copland’s book of the same name, furnishing some insight into the criteria Varga used when listening and judging a new work. The second, “Dogma,” recounts the twentieth-century smothering of individuality and creative imagination by a damp blanket of conformism and authoritarian dictates

Segregation- and association based mapping of loci influencing osmotic tolerance in barley

Identifying quantitative trait loci (QTLs) influencing abiotic stress tolerance could speed up the breeding process via marker assisted selection (MAS), however the accuracy of QTL analysis is a limiting factor to use successfully the identified marker alleles. We used a new approach to map more accurately the loci affecting osmotic tolerance in barley, which permit the introduction of MAS in the breeding process of new and more tolerant varieties against abiotic stresses