Even though small- and medium-sized firms (SMEs) were believed not to proceed beyond exporting in their internationalization routes, we can observe new types of co-operation intensive entrepreneurial firms – so-called “micromultinational enterprises” (mMNEs) – entering the global...

Recent contributions on offshoring often assume that firms can freely split their production process into separate steps which can be ranked according to the cost savings from producing abroad. We replace this assumption by the notion of a technologically determined sequence of production steps....

We study the role of banking relationships in IPO underwriting. Among other issues, we consider whether banking relationships lead to increased access to public equity markets, especially for smaller, lesserknown firms. When a firm in Japan goes public, it can engage an investment bank that is...

This paper concerns the regional innovation system approach. It deals with the characteristics of three regional systems, Northern Hesse, Alpes-Maritime and Jena, and focusses on each regional network of innovators. In this context the importance of the size and homogeneity of a regional pool of...

A business network consists of directly and indirectly connected companies, where social and economic ties help to understand these connection. Innovations could be seen to relate to business networks in two ways: they may result from interaction between business partners, or they would need to...

Existing information systems research thoroughly explains how task-technology fit and appropriation affect performance on an individual or group level. This was appropriate for many years, as technology is typically used to fulfill a certain task on these levels. Today, however, companies are...

Agricultural, quality agro-food, supply-chain and rural districts were introduced by Italian law in 2001. With reference to European structural policies, especially rural development policy, and to the districts' originality and relationship to the LEADER method and programmes, we wonder whether...

An die Internetnutzung und besonders an die Entwicklung des elektronischen Geschäftsverkehrs zwischen Unternehmen - B2B e-Business oder kurz B2B - werden hohe Erwartungen gestellt. Sie sollen die Wettbewerbsfähigkeit der Unternehmen durch sinkende Kosten, schnellere Information und erhöhte...

This study was prepared by Andreas Kuhlmann, while he was working with the Ifo Institute for Economic Research. It was completed in September 2006 and was accepted as a Ph.D. thesis by the Economics Department of the University of Munich. The subject of this study is the analysis of network...