Fuelling conditions at staging sites can mitigate Arctic warming effects in a migratory bird

© 2018, The Author(s). Under climate warming, migratory birds should align reproduction dates with advancing plant and arthropod phenology. To arrive on the breeding grounds earlier, migrants may speed up spring migration by curtailing the time spent en route, possibly at the cost of decreased survival rates. Based on a decades-long series of observations along an entire flyway, we show that when refuelling time is limited, variation in food abundance in the spring staging area affects fitness. Bar-tailed godwits migrating from West Africa to the Siberian Arctic reduce refuelling time at their European staging site and thus maintain a close match between breeding and tundra phenology. Annual survival probability decreases with shorter refuelling times, but correlates positively with refuelling rate, which in turn is correlated with food abundance in the staging area. This chain of effects implies that conditions in the temperate zone determine the ability of godwits to cope with climate-related changes in the Arctic

The two faces of innovation: the relationship between recombination and impact

‘Recombination’ and ‘impact’ have become well established constructs to understand the origins of inventions and their importance for the development of future inventions. Despite forming these two familiar ‘faces of inventions’, their specific relationship has only marginally been subject to inquiry. To address this, this paper studies the relationship between the level of recombination of inventions and their technological impact, along two steps. First, in contrast to the common idea of a linear relationship between recombination and impact we argue that the relationship is in fact a non-linear one. Second, we distinguish between different levels of recombination (low, intermediate, high) and determine their differential impact, thereby establishing which type of recombination leads to the highest level of technological impact. We test our hypotheses on an extensive dataset, comprised of all USPTO granted patents in the biopharmaceutical industry between 1976 and 2006. Our empirical findings indicate strong evidence for a curvilinear relationship between recombination and impact. In addition, we find that an intermediate level of recombination – formed by a combination of components from local, adjacent and distant knowledge domains – carries the highest level of technological impact of all types of inventions. Finally, we discuss implications for the academic literature and for firms’ innovation strategies

Fuelling conditions at staging sites can mitigate Arctic warming effects in a migratory bird

© 2018, The Author(s). Under climate warming, migratory birds should align reproduction dates with advancing plant and arthropod phenology. To arrive on the breeding grounds earlier, migrants may speed up spring migration by curtailing the time spent en route, possibly at the cost of decreased survival rates. Based on a decades-long series of observations along an entire flyway, we show that when refuelling time is limited, variation in food abundance in the spring staging area affects fitness. Bar-tailed godwits migrating from West Africa to the Siberian Arctic reduce refuelling time at their European staging site and thus maintain a close match between breeding and tundra phenology. Annual survival probability decreases with shorter refuelling times, but correlates positively with refuelling rate, which in turn is correlated with food abundance in the staging area. This chain of effects implies that conditions in the temperate zone determine the ability of godwits to cope with climate-related changes in the Arctic

M&A and diversification strategies: what effect on quality of inventive activity?

The aim of this paper is to examine how an acquirer's diversification strategy shapes the multiple dimensions of inventive activity. Differing from prior research, we use a set of indicators to investigate this phenomenon. In particular, we consider three different but complementary dimensions of inventive quality: technological impact, originality of the synthesized knowledge streams, and generality of applicability across different technological domains. The results obtained using a quasi-experimental approach show that diversification via acquisitions has a negative effect on post-acquisition technological impact. However, firms that have diversified outperform those firms that have not. Last, the acquirer's originality and generality increase after the merger and acquisition transaction, evidencing that the inventive activity benefited from the diversification strategy