The Fama-French Five-Factor Model Plus Momentum: Evidence for the German Market

We implement the Fama-French five-factor model and enhance it with a momentum factor for the German market using recent monthly data from 2002 to 2019. We construct the factors associated with the market, size, value, profitability, investment, and momentum for the CDAX constituents and examine to what extent this six-factor model captures the return premia in the German market. Our preliminary analysis does not document any significant evidence on the profitability or investment premium. The results on the six-factor model compared with the three-factor model reveal that the additional factors do not add significant explanatory power to the analysis. We conclude that the relevance of the profitability and investment factors within the context of international asset pricing studies cannot be transferred to the country- specific case of the German market.

Mobile Location-Based Services’ Value-in-Use in Inner Cities: Do a Customer’s Shopping Patterns, Prior User Experience, and Sales Promotions Matter?

Mobile location-based services (LBS) represent a promising opportunity for inner-city retailers and service providers to react to changes in customer behavior due to digitalization. To gain competitive advantages, mobile LBS must offer customers high value-in-use and help them reach their shopping goals during their inner-city visits. Shopping goals differ depending on shopping patterns; thus, these patterns may influence customers’ evaluation of mobile LBS during inner-city visits. Since value-in-use is not only a context-specific but also a temporally dynamic construct, customers’ user experience must also be considered. Therefore, this study investigates the influence of customers’ shopping patterns and current user experience on their evaluation of mobile LBS’ value-in-use during inner-city visits. Moreover, the impacts of the offers transmitted through mobile LBS on the value-in-use are examined. Using field test data, we empirically verify a conceptualization of mobile LBS and determine a comprehensive view of mobile LBS’ value-in-use during shopping trips with different shopping patterns and user experience within a mixed-method analysis. Our results identify both utilitarian and hedonic value-in-use components as being empirically relevant for high value-in-use evaluations regarding mobile LBS in inner cities. Furthermore, the relevance of monetary benefits, fun benefits, and irritation on value-in-use vary according to customers’ user experience. A customer’s shopping pattern affects the value-in-use of mobile LBS; however, this effect is not as differentiated as expected. Moreover, the number of relevant monetary and non-monetary offers transmitted during an inner-city visit are shown to represent a potential, albeit limited, management instrument for affecting mobile LBS’ value-in-use.

Mechanisms and Consequences of Anthropomorphizing Autonomous Products

In the present research, we test the mechanisms (Studies 1a and 1b, conducted online), consequences, and limitations (Study 2, conducted in the lab) of anthropomorphizing autonomous (vs. manual) products. Building on previous theoretical and empirical research on product anthropomorphism, we argue and find that anthropomorphism is perceived to be more congruent with autonomous products than with manual products. Furthermore, we show that anthropomorphism increases the liking of autonomous products, given that consumers have no prior experience with autonomous products. Increased liking of autonomous products due to anthropomorphism, in turn, increases purchase intentions and positive evaluations of outcomes obtained by the autonomous product. The findings are discussed with regard to optimal marketing and design of autonomous products.

It Takes More than Two to Tango: Identifying Roles and Patterns in Multi-Actor Smart Service Innovation

Smart service systems enable innovative value propositions based on smart products and data-driven value creation. Grounded in service-dominant logic as our theoretical lens, we argue that smart service innovation takes place in ecosystems of collaborating actors, as a single actor does not possess all required resources and competencies. We empirically explore smart service innovation using an interview study of 14 experts who were involved in real-world smart service systems engineering projects. As a result, we conceptualize 17 roles that describe the resources and competencies required for smart service innovation at an abstract level. Through the analysis of actor-role constellations in our sample of projects, we further identify four patterns that exhibit different strategic approaches to smart service innovation. Our results advance the theoretical understanding of smart service systems through an empirically grounded systematization of roles, which reflect the resources and competencies required for smart service innovation. With this study, we shed light on the multi-actor and inter-organizational settings of service innovation processes, which have been under-researched so far. Our insights are further helpful for practitioners, who participate in the smart service innovation and who need to analyze their strategic position in service ecosystems.