Do generous trade credit terms provide a competitive edge?

PurposeThe authors document a persistent negative link between contemporaneous trade credit provision and subsequent firm-level operating performance.Design/methodology/approachTextual analysis of firms' profile descriptions is used to study the role of market segmentation and product differentiation in intermediating the nexus between trade credit and corporate performance. The paper relies on dynamic panel regression modeling to investigate the postulated empirical relationships. This approach allows to address endogeneity issues and to test a number of different model specifications.FindingsDespite fueling short-term sales growth, the more generous trade credit terms are found to be associated with lower post hoc margins and declining overall business profitability. The market share is not affected by firms' proclivity to provide trade credit suggesting that the latter may not be effectively used as a long-term growth enhancement strategy. Firms' similarity to their competitors is found to play a salient role in altering the magnitude of the discovered negative relationship.Originality/valueThe authors find that the intensity of intra-industry competition measured by firms' similarity to their competitors magnifies the discovered negative trade credit-performance nexus. Therefore, generous trade credit may play a more important role in solidifying client–supplier relationships on the more segmented markets with a higher degree of product differentiation.

Toward Accountable Education in the Medical Sciences Universities by Connecting Innovation and Intellectual Capital

This article addresses this important issue that medical sciences universities are an organization that is rich in intellectual capital in various fields and specialties and also have multiple customers and segmented markets. Therefore, it is necessary to establish a connection between these assets and innovation by properly managing the intelligent capital and identifying the society’ S needs. It should also avoid continuing to educate academic fields that are no longer needed by society and try to replace them with ones that are appropriate to the needs of society to save its tangible capital. This means that education is accountable for the needs of society. This will not happen unless establishing a continuous and strong connection between the university and industry.

Toward Accountable Education in the Medical Sciences Universities by Connecting Innovation and Intellectual Capital

This article addresses this important issue that medical sciences universities are an organization that is rich in intellectual capital in various fields and specialties and also have multiple customers and segmented markets. Therefore, it is necessary to establish a connection between these assets and innovation by properly managing the intelligent capital and identifying the society’ S needs. It should also avoid continuing to educate academic fields that are no longer needed by society and try to replace them with ones that are appropriate to the needs of society to save its tangible capital. This means that education is accountable for the needs of society. This will not happen unless establishing a continuous and strong connection between the university and industry.

Differences between end user innovators and embedded user innovators in diffusion channel selection: the moderating role of technological advances

PurposeIn heterogeneously segmented markets, collaborating with product users in product innovation is important for business success. End user innovators and embedded user innovators differ in terms of their prior embeddedness in the target industry. The purpose of this study is twofold. First, the authors empirically compare these two types of user innovators in terms of their diffusion channel selection. Second, the authors analyze how the technological advances of their innovations affect this difference.Design/methodology/approachUsing an online questionnaire survey, this study collected a sample of 237 user-generated innovations in Japan and analyzed several hypotheses using quantitative statistical approaches.FindingsThe analysis shows that embedded user innovators are more likely than end user innovators to transfer their innovations to producers rather than peers. As the technological advances of their innovations increase, end user innovators' likelihood of transferring their innovation to producers increases more significantly than that of embedded user innovators.Originality/valueThis is the first paper to investigate the difference between end user innovators and embedded user innovators with respect to their diffusion channel selection as well as the moderating role of technological advances. The findings bring new perspectives to the domains of user–producer collaboration and technology transfer.

Reducing Attribute Non-Attendance Risk in Choice Experiment: An application of Design Attribute Relative Importance Index for Waste Management Service Provision in Segmented Markets

Attribute non-attendance is an estimation problem that biases welfare estimates in the economic valuation of environmental goods when choice experiment (CE) is used. The potential for observing the problem is increased when segmented markets with dissimilar preferences exist for environmental goods but not captured in the experimental design for CE. The current procedure for avoiding this problem relies on qualitative techniques, which limits applications to large samples and thus prone to bias. To reduce such bias, this study used an alternative technique based on the design-attribute relative importance index (DARII) to determine respondents’ prioritization of attributes within and across markets. Our results in solid waste management services demonstrate that all selected attributes were highly ranked across markets. While such finding conforms to expectations based on the interview, we found a statistically significant difference in attributes prioritization across markets. We thus conclude that assuming equal priority for attributes in different market segments may be improper but possibly tangled when the qualitative method is used. As such, the study recommends CE studies to use DARII before the experimental design stage.