New Product Announcements as Market Signals. A content analysis in the DRAM chip industry

New-product announcements (NPAs) have considerable effects on competitors in industrial markets. Several studies have shown that the perceived threat caused by an NPA may trigger severe competitive reactions. Yet it is still unclear how the perception of threat by competitors is related to the specific content of the announcement. In this study we explore the actual content of NPAs observed in a particular market. We do this through a multi-year content analysis of new-product announcements in the DRAM memory chip industry. We analyze patterns in the occurrence of attributes and demonstrate how firm strategy affects NPA content. Findings from this study provide important insights for managers about the design of NPAs. It also triggers further research on the use of NPAs in competitive industrial markets.competition;innovation;market signals;new product announcement;semiconductors

Solution structure of a repeated unit of the ABA-1 nematode polyprotein allergen of ascaris reveals a novel fold and two discrete lipid-binding sites

Parasitic nematode worms cause serious health problems in humans and other animals. They can induce allergic-type immune responses, which can be harmful but may at the same time protect against the infections. Allergens are proteins that trigger allergic reactions and these parasites produce a type that is confined to nematodes, the nematode polyprotein allergens (NPAs). These are synthesized as large precursor proteins comprising repeating units of similar amino acid sequence that are subsequently cleaved into multiple copies of the allergen protein. NPAs bind small lipids such as fatty acids and retinol (Vitamin A) and probably transport these sensitive and insoluble compounds between the tissues of the worms. Nematodes cannot synthesize these lipids, so NPAs may also be crucial for extracting nutrients from their hosts. They may also be involved in altering immune responses by controlling the lipids by which the immune and inflammatory cells communicate. We describe the molecular structure of one unit of an NPA, the well-known ABA-1 allergen of Ascaris and find its structure to be of a type not previously found for lipid-binding proteins, and we describe the unusual sites where lipids bind within this structur

Clinical and molecular epidemiology of human bocavirus in respiratory and fecal samples from children in Hong Kong

Background. Human bocavirus (HBoV) is a recently discovered parvovirus associated with respiratory tract infections in children. We conducted the first systematic prospective clinical and molecular study using nasopharyngeal aspirates (NPAs) and fecal samples. Methods. NPAs negative for influenza virus, parainfluenza virus, respiratory syncytial virus, adenovirus, and coronavirus and fecal samples from patients with acute gastroenteritis were included. On the basis of results from a pilot study using 400 NPAs from all age groups, a prospective 12-month study was conducted to detect HBoV in 1200 NPAs and 1435 fecal samples from patients <18 years old by polymerase chain reaction. The complete genome sequences of HBoVs from 12 NPAs and 12 fecal samples were determined. Results. Of the 400 NPAs collected in the pilot study, 20 (5.0%) were found to contain HBoV, all from children <5 years old. In the subsequent prospective study of pediatric patients, HBoV was detected in 83 (6.9%) of 1200 NPAs. Upper and lower respiratory tract infections were equally common. HBoV was detected in 30 (2.1%) of 1435 fecal samples. Fever and watery diarrhea were the most common symptoms. The seasonality of HBoV in NPAs and fecal samples was similar. Codetection with other pathogens occurred in 33% and 56% of NPAs and fecal samples, respectively, from patients with HBoV infection. Genomes of HBoVs from NPAs and fecal samples displayed minimal sequence variations. Conclusions. HBoV was detected in fecal specimens in children with acute gastroenteritis. A single lineage of HBoV was associated with both respiratory tract and enteric infections. © 2007 by the Infectious Diseases Society of America. All rights reserved.published_or_final_versio

Obstructing justice : the federal government’s disuse of deferred prosecution agreements for non-corporate defendants

Deferred prosecution agreements (DPAs) are voluntary agreements between prosecutors and defendants in which the government agrees to suspend prosecution for a specified period of time while the defendant is monitored for compliance with certain conditions. Though Congress modeled the legislation authorizing federal use of DPAs on pretrial diversion programs targeting nonviolent, nonrecidivist drug offenders, the Department of Justice today uses DPAs almost exclusively for resolving corporate criminal liability. Given the federal government’s emphasis on remedying mass incarceration and the collateral consequences of criminal convictions, expanding the federal use of DPAs to the class of offenders and offenses for which such agreements were intended represents an unexplored opportunity for achieving meaningful criminal justice reform.LawPublic Affair

Evaluation of the National Parks Sustainable Development Fund

The Sustainable Development Fund (SDF) is a new pilot funding stream for English National Park Authorities and the Broads Authority (henceforth collectively NPAs or ‘Parks’), launched in July 2002 by the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). The aim is to provide a flexible and non-bureaucratic means of funding projects that “aid the achievement of National Park purposes by encouraging individuals, community groups and businesses to cooperate together to develop practical sustainable solutions to the management of their activities”. SDF is a novel and unique funding stream intended to support original and innovative projects. Although the funding is relatively small (some £2.6m or £325,000 per park over the 18 months to this report) the aim is ambitious; with a minimum of preconceptions or formalities, to “develop and test new ways of achieving a more sustainable way of living in the countryside”. In each Park, small SDF Panels, serviced by, but at arms length from, the NPA have been established to oversee delivery of the Fund, to foster innovative projects and to monitor their outcomes at Park level. The SDF Prospectus declares that monitoring and evaluation are to involve a “very light touch regime”.. Auditing of individual projects by the SDF panel is to be achieved mainly by maintaining close contact with the projects as they develop. Whilst responsibility may be delegated, panel members are encouraged to take a personal interest in projects. Each NPA is required to submit to the Minister of State for Rural Affairs (and to copy to the Countryside Agency) an annual report. This should summarise the performance of the fund against performance indicators which are to be developed by NPAs themselves in the light of experience of the fund. First Annual Reports must be submitted to the Minister of State for Rural Affairs (and copied to the Countryside Agency) at the end of March 2004 NPAs are encouraged to learn from the experience of delivering the Fund and to promote the results to a wider rural audience. In addition to this Park level monitoring, the Countryside Agency (CA) on behalf of Defra has commissioned the Centre for European Protected Area Research (CEPAR) to conduct an evaluation of how SDF has performed against its key objectives after the first eighteen months of its operation, to aid decisions about the future of the scheme from April 2005

Ten Years of Experience Training Non-Physician Anesthesia Providers in Haiti.

Surgery is increasingly recognized as an effective means of treating a proportion of the global burden of disease, especially in resource-limited countries. Often non-physicians, such as nurses, provide the majority of anesthesia; however, their training and formal supervision is often of low priority or even non-existent. To increase the number of safe anesthesia providers in Haiti, Médecins Sans Frontières has trained nurse anesthetists (NAs) for over 10 years. This article describes the challenges, outcomes, and future directions of this training program. From 1998 to 2008, 24 students graduated. Nineteen (79%) continue to work as NAs in Haiti and 5 (21%) have emigrated. In 2008, NAs were critical in providing anesthesia during a post-hurricane emergency where they performed 330 procedures. Mortality was 0.3% and not associated with lack of anesthesiologist supervision. The completion rate of this training program was high and the majority of graduates continue to work as nurse anesthetists in Haiti. Successful training requires a setting with a sufficient volume and diversity of operations, appropriate anesthesia equipment, a structured and comprehensive training program, and recognition of the training program by the national ministry of health and relevant professional bodies. Preliminary outcomes support findings elsewhere that NAs can be a safe and effective alternative where anesthesiologists are scarce. Training non-physician anesthetists is a feasible and important way to scale up surgical services resource limited settings

Narrow Banking: Theory, evidence and prospects in India

The narrow banking proposal defining a class of safe and liquid assets (generally sovereign Government securities) for investments by weak banks, backed fully by demand liabilities (generally non-interest bearing deposits) has been considered as a means of deposit protection and a possible solution to the banking problems. The paper seeks to explain the theoretical implications of the proposal and examine its implications for the Indian public sector banks facing large non-performing loans. The evidence presented shows that even without a directive, narrow banking on the asset side is already being practised as part of the asset-liability management by these banks. However, given the structure of deposit ownership, narrow banking in its strict sense does not afford a solution to reforming weak banks. Strictly practiced narrow banking can neither guarantee deposit protection not turn around the weak banks. On the contrary, it may expose weak banks to immense market and interest rate risks which can make the banking system vulnerable to idiosyncratic and systemic risks arising from macroeconomic shocks. The paper however recognises that some contraction in the scale of operations of weak banks seems to be an unavoidable by-product of measures which may be necessary to strengthen weak banks.Narrow banking; government securities; deposit insurance; India

Latitude: A Model for Mixed Linear-Tropical Matrix Factorization

Nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) is one of the most frequently-used matrix factorization models in data analysis. A significant reason to the popularity of NMF is its interpretability and the `parts of whole' interpretation of its components. Recently, max-times, or subtropical, matrix factorization (SMF) has been introduced as an alternative model with equally interpretable `winner takes it all' interpretation. In this paper we propose a new mixed linear--tropical model, and a new algorithm, called Latitude, that combines NMF and SMF, being able to smoothly alternate between the two. In our model, the data is modeled using the latent factors and latent parameters that control whether the factors are interpreted as NMF or SMF features, or their mixtures. We present an algorithm for our novel matrix factorization. Our experiments show that our algorithm improves over both baselines, and can yield interpretable results that reveal more of the latent structure than either NMF or SMF alone.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures. To appear in 2018 SIAM International Conference on Data Mining (SDM '18). For the source code, see https://people.mpi-inf.mpg.de/~pmiettin/linear-tropical

Institutional Credit through Cooperatives in Maharashtra: A Region-wise Analysis

In the era of financial sector reforms, sustainability, viability and operational efficiency of rural financial institutions (RFIs) are the major issues that need to be taken cognizance of in ensuring effective rural credit delivery system. However, the major problems plaguing the efficiency of rural credit delivery system are the mounting overdue and Non Performing Assets (NPAs) of RFIs. In the state of Maharashtra, the credit cooperatives have not only shown slower growth in their institutional finance coupled with much slower growth in their membership but also faster growth in outstanding loans as against their loan advances during the reform period. The reason for this dismal scenario can be associated with adverse environment created by the financial sector reforms, which have reduced the entire rural credit delivery through cooperatives to a moribund state. The financial sector reforms have accorded greater flexibility to cooperatives to invest in non-target avenues like shares and debentures of corporates, units of mutual funds, bonds of public sector undertakings, etc. This has affected credit flow from these major institutions operating in rural Maharashtra as most of their loans meant for farm finance are diverted to investments. The estimates of this study also show not only wide variation in total and crop loan advances of PACS but also their outstanding loans, overdue and per member borrowing across different regions of Maharashtra. The outstanding loan of PACS based on per hectare GCA is seen to have exceeded loan advances with a comfortable margin in all the regions of the state. Although increase in outstanding loan with rise in loan advances and GCA is another issue, the most important one among all is the mounting overdue and NPAs of cooperatives that sets a path where from there is no return and, which ultimately leads to inefficiency in cooperative credit delivery. In order to rejuvenate rural credit delivery system through cooperatives, the major problems facing the system, viz., high transaction cost, poor repayment performance, mounting NPAs, distributional aspect of credit, coverage of various social groups, etc., need to be tackled with more fiscal jurisprudence reserving exemplary punishment for willful defaults, particularly large farmers. In fact, insofar as the rural credit delivery system is concerned, the focus should be on strategies that are required for tackling issues such as sustainability and viability, operational efficiency, recovery performance, small farmer coverage and balanced sectoral development.Institutional Credit Cooperatives Region-wise Analysis