In 2010 China was the world's fourth largest filer of patent applications. This followed a decade of unprecedented increases in investment in skills and Research and Development. If current trends continue China could rank first in the very near future. We provide evidence that the growth in...

Strategic human resource management has been linked to competitive advantage and in turn to organizational performance. This linkage has been viewed from a universal, a contextual or a configurational perspective. Adopting the latter perspective, the authors of the present study investigate the...

According to the Resource Based View of strategic management, analyzing the human resource of a specific firm in terms of its potential to serve as a source of a sustainable competitive advantage requires an examination of - among others - the resource value. The question of how to parameterize...

The question of whether firms gain competitiveness through local networks and clusters becomes more relevant than ever as globalization proceeds. This is particularly true for traditional and craft-based clusters, districts and business networks. A central question emerging for these types of...

Public policy and cluster management face a common challenge in developing sustainable clusters. Many clusters report difficulties acquiring membership fees once the governmental subsidies come to an end, which brings doubts as to the cluster management's capabilities and likewise to the public...

Keskustelualoitteessa esitellään Suomen metsäteollisuuden ja bioteollisuuden panos-tuotosrakenteita, metsäteollisuuden kansainvälistä kustannuskilpailukykyä ja mahdollisuuksia arvonluontiin soveltamalla bioteknisiä innovaatioita tuotantoprosesseissa. Yleisesti ottaen metsäteollisuus...

The aim of the paper is, firstly, to identify a number of strategies Swiss firms pursue by performing foreign R&D, expecting that firms, in many instances, are driven by a combination of several motives ("mixed strategies"). Secondly, we ask whether foreign and domestic R&D are substitutes or...

Industrielle Rüstvorgänge sind durch ihren zentralen und zeitkritischen Charakter innerhalb eines Produktionsprozesses elementar. Optimierungsbestrebungen dieser Prozesse erfolgen insbesondere hinsichtlich des Zeitaufwandes und der Ressourcenschonung. In diesem Zusammenhang findet die...