Exploring Strategic Choices of Airlines: A Study in Turkish Air Transport Industry

Inter-firm competition in the field of aviation, which accelerates through liberalisation and globalisation trends, has been investigated by numerous studies in the post-deregulation era; however, it has not been adequately addressed in Turkish aviation market. The aim of this study is to unveil the business strategies and strategic typologies of Turkish passenger carriers, as well as the degree of involvement of firms in the strategic planning process, the current outlook, and the competitive structure of the Turkish passenger air transport industry. The research is designed in a way to collect data through interviews with senior executives of the airlines. In terms of findings, the study concludes that five scheduled airlines and three charter airlines have attempted to implement more than one generic strategy at the same time as an “integrated cost and differentiation strategy,” with the primary strategy being cost leadership. Moreover, the passenger carriers in question displayed the features of “analysers-defenders” mainly linked to the competitive typology viewpoint. This study is believed to lead to a deeper understanding of potential explanations why companies have made specific strategic choices regarding generic strategies and strategic approaches. Regulators, individual companies operating in the aviation industry and prospective companies, investors, etc. can use the results of the study to regulate the market, better understand their competitors, set their priorities and plans, evaluate, and assess the market.

Reacting to the COVID-19 pandemic through digital connectivity with customers: the Italian experience

The COVID-19 has deeply impacted the firm’s competitiveness because of the restrictions that limited the relationships with existing and new customers. The pandemic has pushed firms to rely on digital technologies to redefine business processes as well as customer relationships and marketing strategies. The digital technological portfolio firms may rely on to face the COVID-19 related challenges spanning from the established web-based technologies to the more recent Industry 4.0 tools related to the fourth industrial revolution. In this regard, the paper aims at exploring which digital technologies allowed firms to positively react to the pandemic to overcome their constraints in managing the market relationships. Based on an original qualitative analysis on 26 Italian SMEs carried out during the first Italian lockdown in 2020, the paper identifies three strategies in the use of digital technologies to support customer relationship management and market expansion. It emerges specifically the strategic importance of web-based technologies (videoconferencing, CRM and e-commerce) to support firm competition and performance through customer interactions and digital experience, advancing the literature on firms’ reaction strategies during turbulent and crisis times.

CORPORATE BUSINESS MODELS OF VENTURE FINANCING: MODERN MECHANISMS

The article is devoted to the concept of corporate venture, which is based on the key methodological basis that the sources of innovation are formed both within and outside companies in the format of external ventures. They are founded by one or more companies on a share basis and take the form of organizational, economic and institutional forms of complex integration and cooperation structures and research consortia formed between autonomous and independent economic entities. Thus, one of the examples is strategic venture alliances, as one of the main institutional forms of external corporate venture. Next, we consider joint ventures created with the participation of donors and recipients of venture capital by establishing new legal entities or registration of the venture fund's participation in the share capital of high-tech companies. The advanced dynamics of techno-globalization processes against the background of unprecedented complication of the international business environment and the intensification of inter-firm competition for the most technologically breakthrough innovative developments raise the issue of mergers and acquisitions. Another organizational form of implementing external corporate venture mechanisms is the participation of companies in innovation clusters. There is also a rapid dynamization of cooperation of corporate venture funds with leading universities, research institutes, centers and laboratories. Therefore, it should be noted that external corporate venture is actively developing today in the general course of objective laws, patterns and trends of the global venture industry, demonstrating the high risks of venture investment, the predominant focus of BNP on innovation cooperation. This provides not only a significant increase in the economic efficiency of corporate R&D and expansion of existing innovation opportunities and sectoral-sectoral "space" of corporate business, but also the formation of its global "cognitive framework" as a full understanding of the nature and vector orientation of global market and technology transformations.

Hierarchical model of competition under uncertainty

Oligopoly is a basic concept in the theory of competition. This structure is the central object of research in the economics of markets. There are many mathematical models of the market that are formalized in the form of an oligopoly in economic theory. The Cournot oligopoly is an elementary mathematical model of competition. The principle of equilibrium formalizes the non-cooperative nature of the conflict. Each player chooses the equilibrium strategy of behavior that provides the greatest profit, provided that the other competitors adhere to their equilibrium strategies. The Stackelberg model describes a two-level hierarchical model of firm competition. The top-level player (center, leader) chooses his strategy, assuming reasonable (optimal) decision-making by the lower-level players. Lower-level players (agents, followers) recognize the leadership of the center. They consider the center's strategies known. These players choose their strategies, wanting to maximize their payoff functions. This hierarchical structure is from a game point of view a case of a hierarchical game Gamma1. The indefinite uncontrolled factors (uncertainties) are the values for which only the range of possible values is known in this paper. Recently, studies of game models under uncertainty have been actively conducted. In particular, non-coalitional games under uncertainty are investigated. The concepts of risk and regret are formalized in various ways in the theory of problems with uncertainty. At the same time, the decision-maker takes into account both the expected losses and the possibility of favorable actions of factors beyond his control.\nThis article examines the two-level hierarchical structure of decision-making in the problem of firm competition. A linear-quadratic model with two levels of hierarchy is considered. This model uses the concepts of Cournot and Stackelberg under uncertainty. Uncontrolled factors (uncertainties) are identified with the actions of the importing company. The Wald and Savage principles are used to formalize the solution. According to Wald's maximin criterion, game with nature is seen as a conflict with a player who wants to harm the decision-maker as much as possible.\n\nSavage's minimax regret criterion, when choosing the optimal strategy, focuses not on winning, but on regret. As an optimal strategy, the strategy is chosen in which the amount of regret in the worst conditions is minimal. A new approach to decision-making in the game with nature is formalized. It allows you to combine the positive features of both principles and weaken their negative properties. The concept of U-optimal solution of the problem in terms of risks and regrets is considered.\nThe problems of formalization of some types of optimal solutions for a specific linear-quadratic problem with two levels of hierarchy are solved.

Subsidiary initiatives of multinationals face both environmental and local conflicts

Purpose The research was governed by the following questions: 1. What opportunities and conflicts do subsidiary initiatives create in HQ-subsidiary relationships? 2. How does the MNC subsidiary network stifle or oppose subsidiary initiatives, and what role does HQ play in this process? 3. Does the subsidiary’s operating environment generate obstacles to new initiatives? 4. What factors moderate subsidiary initiative conflict in the MNC network? Design/methodology/approach The authors reviewed publications focusing on subsidiary initiatives from four leading databases – JSTOR, EBSCO, Google Scholar and Science Direct. They chose 52 papers for analysis of HQ-subsidiary issues. They chose an additional 62 publications that related to local environmental pressures that hindered subsidiaries. They narrowed their focus to emerging markets such as Nigeria Findings For subsidiary initiatives to do well, it’s essential to attract the “attention or interest” of HQ. But HQ pays attention only if it sees how the local plans will contribute to the corporation's overall interests. The corporate immune system (CIS) may become a major obstacle. It usually arises when CIS conflict triggers intra-firm competition over similar products between rival subsidiaries. However, if HQ perceives a subsidiary as having superior strategy it will be supportive of its initiatives. Originality/value Previous studies had focused on internal issues at the multinationals, whereas the authors wanted to study also the environmental obstacles to subsidiary initiatives

Factors affecting the determination of target costing in the mini manufacturing companies in Sudan: Field Study: العوامل المؤثرة في تحديد التكلفة المستهدفة في الشركات الصناعية الصغيرة في السودان: دراسة ميدانية

This study aims to achieve a number of the goals which relate to scheduling on the target costing including its definition and the stage of the deterring target costing and explaining the effects of the number of factors in the determining in manufactures companies in Sudan. This study has adopted the analytical descriptive approach. The study has concluded that target costing is one of the modern cost systems which have an approach as results of the firm competition. it depends on staring by recognizing customer needs and trying to achieve them as valuable as possible the study has also pointed out that these factors differ in the degree of effect in the process of determining target costing in Sudan based on these results the researcher has come with a number of recommendation the most important of which is that there must be a great costing deep of explanation for the theoretical framework of target costing among the companies in order to help these companies come along with the level and international competition locally and systematically. the researcher has also recommended the should be training and learning in the companies in the market competition so that manger can recognize the modernity of accounting mutuality In addition, the researcher emphasizes the importance of cost –accounting awareness of the features accomplished by application of target costing and conducting more applied and theoretical studies and taking care of the raw material price and the quality of the material.

Chinese Telecommunications Companies in Ethiopia: The Influences of Host Government Intervention and Inter-firm Competition

This article examines Chinese engagement in Ethiopia's telecommunications sector. It argues that while theories of developmental state and global production networks contribute important insights on the roles of state agency and inter-firm relations in the rise of global lead firms from East Asia, they are insufficient to interpret the recent overseas ventures of Chinese companies in Africa. A case study of one flagship Chinese telecommunications company in Ethiopia advances the existing literature by highlighting the influences of host government intervention and inter-firm competition in shaping firms’ local operations. Specifically, this article analyses a myriad of changes in the case company's organizational structure and business practices in response to increased market competition administered by the Ethiopian government. Findings reveal that despite benefiting from official inter-state cooperation, Chinese overseas companies are neither static nor merely state-driven players but are flexible in adjusting strategies to improve their competitiveness in the local market.

The Effect of Managerial Ownership, Financial Performance, Corporate Competition on Stock Prices with Capital Structure as the Intervening Variable in the Coal Mining Companies Listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange

This study aimed to find out the effect of managerial ownership, financial performance, corporate competition on stock prices with capital structure as the intervening variable in the coal mining companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange. Managerial ownership variables by the shareholding presentation. Financial performance variables by Total Asset Turnover (TATO). Firm competition variable by Concentration Ratio (CR). Capital structure variables by Debt to Equity Ratio (DER). Stock prices variable by Price to Book Value (PBV). The population of this study was the coal mining companies listed on the IDX. This study used Purposive as the sampling technique. The data source was secondary data from financial statements published through the IDX official website. This study used descriptive statistics and inferential statistics with a quantitative approach using regression techniques with the E-Views version 10 program. The results of this study showed that the dealings of managerial ownership had a positive and significant effect on DER, TATO had a negative and not significant effect on DER, while CR had a negative and significant effect on DER. The dealings of managerial ownership, TATO, DER has a positive and significant effect on PBV, while CR has a negative and not significant. The dealings of managerial ownership influences PBV through DER, interestingly TATO has no effect on PBV through DER and CR influences PBV through DER