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Full-Text Articles in Business

Technology On The Factory Floor Iii: Technology Use And Training In Us Manufacturing Firms, Paul Swamidass Aug 1998

Technology On The Factory Floor Iii: Technology Use And Training In Us Manufacturing Firms, Paul Swamidass

Paul Swamidass

This is the third issue of the Technology on the Factory Floor series. The study was sponsored by the Manufacturing Institute and the National Science Foundation. Data for this study of manufacturing technology use was collected from 1,025 manufacturing plant managers during 1997 using a modified survey questionnaire originally used in the 1993 study.

The findings were: Since the 1993 study, inventory turnover increased, rejection and rework reduced, and cycle time and manufacturing costs decreased; overall, there was measurable improvement in manufacturing since 1993. Other findings were: larger plants use technologies more extensively than smaller plants; exporters use more manufacturing …


A Bird's Eye View Of Authority Control In Cataloging, Karen S. Calhoun May 1998

A Bird's Eye View Of Authority Control In Cataloging, Karen S. Calhoun

Karen S Calhoun

In this invited paper for an NSF-funded workshop for the systematics and library communities, Calhoun relates the story of cooperative authority control in libraries, drawing parallels to the problem domain of the systematics community and biological information managers. She describes what made community-wide authority control possible in libraries; offers a high-level view of how it works from systems and practitioner perspectives; and assesses the limitations, prospects and challenges for the current authority control framework in libraries.


Old And New Theories Of Industry Clusters, Edward J. Feser Jan 1998

Old And New Theories Of Industry Clusters, Edward J. Feser

Edward J Feser

The paper reviews the broad range of theories and ideas that constitute, often implicitly, the logic behind strategic cluster policies. The title of the paper notwithstanding, there is no theory of industry clusters, per se. Even Porter’s (1990) seminal contribution is more a theory of firm competitiveness than clusters. There is, instead, a variety of older and newer theories of 1) the interrelationships between economic actors that clusters describe, and 2) the implications of such interrelationships for economic growth and development. Industry clusters have proven a useful way of characterizing webs of relationships between and among firms and other institutions. …


The Relationship Between Boards Of Directors And Initial Public Offerings In The Biotechnology Industry, Todd A. Finkle Dec 1997

The Relationship Between Boards Of Directors And Initial Public Offerings In The Biotechnology Industry, Todd A. Finkle

Todd A Finkle

Utilizing the entire population of public biotechnology firms from 1980-1994, three models were tested to determine if a relationship exists between the size and composition of the board of directors with performance. Results indicate significant positive relationships between director expertise and the size of a firm’s initial public offering. Going public during hot markets and larger firms were also related to larger initial public offerings. These findings will benefit practitioners in the formation of boards within the biotechnology industry. Managers of firms within the biotechnology industry who are contemplating a public offering will be able to proactively address the composition …