This book addresses the question of how competition takes place in international manufacturing industries. It examines patterns of rivalry among firms from different countries across national boundaries and their influences on international trade and investment. By using various data on Japanese firms in manufacturing industries from the late 1950s through the early 2000s, the first part of this book presents a series of empirical analyses that examines effects of market structure on export pricing, linkages of domestic and foreign market structures on trade performance, and patterns of oligopolistic interactions among firms from different countries in exporting. The second part of this book deals with the impact of strategic interactions on foreign direct investment. In particular, the book examines 'bunching' in foreign direct investment, strategic interactions in intra-industry cross-market foreign direct investment, and their effects on entry patterns and post-entry performance.

"Plastics End Use Applications" is a SpringerBrief designed to keep professionals in the plastics industry abreast of key technical developments, business strategies and marketing initiatives in plastics and competitive materials that impact sales and usage. It is concisely focused on the five major competitive material areas-plastic, metal, paper and wood, rubber, and glass and ceramic-and how they interact in the twenty major plastic end-use market segments. For the global plastics professional, this book offers a way to enhance plastics technical and marketing insights. "Plastics End Use Applications" is of most value to manufacturing engineers, research and development professionals and general researchers interested in plastics and materials science.

Cotton's Renaissance is an analytical and interpretive history of the responses of US cotton growers to problems of supply and demand, and of the unique public-private organization they founded to help them grow, compete, and survive in an increasingly competitive marketplace. It is a story of how cotton growers learned, after more than a century and a half of trying to manage supply, that they could actually influence demand for their commodity. The impact of that company, Cotton Incorporated, on the markets for cotton was a remarkable achievement in organizational entrepreneurship. In its 'total marketing' effort to rebuild cotton's market share, it has fostered substantial scientific, technological, and managerial improvements in the quality and performance of cotton. In doing so, it has enhanced the efficiency of not only the farmers who grow cotton, but also those who transform it into consumer goods.

Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795) was a master potter who pioneered the industrialisation of pottery manufacture during the early Industrial Revolution. His experimental work on ceramics resulted in many innovations in the production and decoration of pottery. This three-volume work, edited by his great-granddaughter Katherine Eufemia Farrer and first published between 1903 and 1906, contains Wedgwood's letters to his business partner, the Liverpool merchant Thomas Bentley (1730-1780). Wedgwood's highly successful partnership with Bentley is credited with the expansion and development of Wedgwood's reputation across Europe. The letters cover the years 1762 to 1794 and provide a lively account both of the growth of the business partnership and of Wedgwood's domestic life. Wedgwood and Bentley also maintained a keen interest in current affairs, and these volumes provide a fascinating glimpse into the society and domestic life of the late eighteenth century. Volume 1 covers 1762-1772.

Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795) was a master potter who pioneered the industrialisation of pottery manufacture during the early Industrial Revolution. His experimental work on ceramics resulted in many innovations in the production and decoration of pottery. This three-volume work, edited by his great-granddaughter Katherine Eufemia Farrer and published between 1903 and 1906, contains Wedgwood's letters to his business partner Thomas Bentley (1730-1780) and others. Wedgwood's highly successful partnership with Bentley is credited with the expansion and development of Wedgwood's reputation across Europe. The letters cover the years 1762 to 1794 and provide a lively account both of the growth of the business partnership and of Wedgwood's domestic life. Wedgwood maintained a keen interest in current affairs, and these volumes provide a fascinating glimpse into the society and domestic life of the late eighteenth century. Volume 3 covers 1781-1794.

Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795) was a master potter who pioneered the industrialisation of pottery manufacture during the early Industrial Revolution. His experimental work on ceramics resulted in many innovations in the production and decoration of pottery. This three-volume work, edited by his great-granddaughter Katherine Eufemia Farrer and first published between 1903 and 1906, contains Wedgwood's letters to his business partner, the Liverpool merchant Thomas Bentley (1730-1780). Wedgwood's highly successful partnership with Bentley is credited with the expansion and development of Wedgwood's reputation across Europe. The letters cover the years 1762 to 1794 and provide a lively account both of the growth of the business partnership and of Wedgwood's domestic life. Wedgwood and Bentley also maintained a keen interest in current affairs, and these volumes provide a fascinating glimpse into the society and domestic life of the late eighteenth century. Volume 2 covers 1772-1780.

This is an innovative analysis of the agrarian world and growth of government in early modern Germany through the medium of pre-industrial society's most basic material resource, wood. Paul Warde offers a regional study of south-west Germany from the late fifteenth to the early eighteenth century, demonstrating the stability of the economy and social structure through periods of demographic pressure, warfare and epidemic. He casts light on the nature of 'wood shortages' and societal response to environmental challenge, and shows how institutional responses largely based on preventing local conflict were poor at adapting to optimise the management of resources. Warde further argues for the inadequacy of models that oppose the 'market' to a 'natural economy' in understanding economic behaviour. This is a major contribution to debates about the sustainability of peasant society in early modern Europe, and to the growth of ecological approaches to history and historical geography.

Fort Dunlop, in the Erdington district of Birmingham, was the original tyre factory and main office of Dunlop Rubber which for many years was the jewel in the crown of the Dunlop empire. 'The Fort', as it was affectionately known locally, was built in 1916 and by 1954 the entire factory area employed 10,000 workers. At one time it was one of the largest factories in the world and employed a significant proportion of the local population, often whole families worked there. Gradually foreign imports led to Fort Dunlop's demise, large scale tyre production ceased and the factory finally closed in 2014 with production moved to Germany and France. This book, compiled by a former employee, is a look back at the history of Fort Dunlop through the recollections and memories of many other members of its workforce. What emerges is a very family orientated company which played a huge part in the lives of many people who worked there or lived nearby. The building itself still remains as an iconic landmark and reminder of 'The Fort' in its heyday.

Innovation is a key to corporate success, particularly in times of rapid technological change. This book sheds new light on the introduction of technology in the manufacturing sector. The author considers the use of innovative technology in both Britain and Japan by examining nine firms in each country. He focuses on computerized machine tools (CNC) and shows how the various firms have risen to the challenge of implementing the new technology. Particular emphasis is placed on the differing employment relations in the factories, the nature of operator training and workload distribution. Dr. Whittaker identifies fundamentally different approaches in the two countries that have implications for competitiveness as well as future innovation. The contrast is especially interesting since Japanese industrial relations are commonly distinguished by their cooperative nature while industrial relations in Britain have tended to be more confrontational. These conventional views are challenged with an original perspective on the labor process and new technology. The book will be of major interest to specialists in technical innovation and industrial relations. Managers eager to learn the practical lessons of a comparison between British and Japanese work habits will also gain much from reading this book.

This book, first published in 2000, examines how a group of manufacturers of metal products - 'everything from buttonhooks to battleships' - in America's third biggest city helped each other to meet the challenges of organized labour (and sometimes an interventionist state) in the half-century between the 'second industrial revolution' and the Second World War. After thirty years of success, the employers were finally overwhelmed by a resurgent labour movement backed by New Deal politicians and administrators. Their story offers the broadest and most detailed account available of the industrial relations problems and policies of small and mid-sized firms in this period. This book analyses labour issues by means of a careful local case study, but its conclusions about the interplay of labour, organized capital, law and the state in determining the fate of workers' rights and employers' interests have broad relevance to the history and politics of twentieth-century industrial relations.

This is an innovative analysis of the agrarian world and growth of government in early modern Germany through the medium of pre-industrial society's most basic material resource, wood. Paul Warde offers a regional study of south-west Germany from the late fifteenth to the early eighteenth century, demonstrating the stability of the economy and social structure through periods of demographic pressure, warfare and epidemic. He casts light on the nature of 'wood shortages' and societal response to environmental challenge, and shows how institutional responses largely based on preventing local conflict were poor at adapting to optimise the management of resources. Warde further argues for the inadequacy of models that oppose the 'market' to a 'natural economy' in understanding economic behaviour. This is a major contribution to debates about the sustainability of peasant society in early modern Europe, and to the growth of ecological approaches to history and historical geography.

Machine tools are vital to our industrial, metal-using society. This book is the first history of the British machine-tool industry during an important period of its development, a time when it played a crucial part in the transformation of the British economy. The author discusses the structure of the industry, its performance in international trade, and, through an analysis of the voluminous records of one firm, its efficiency and productivity. This discussion is placed within the wider context of current controversies about the behaviour of the British economy during the 'Great Depression' of the later nineteenth century, and its conclusions do not support pessimistic views of the performance of British industry. The book is also intended as a contribution to the explanation of the process of technological change, a problem of increasing interest to economists and economic historians.

Textiles were the second-most-traded commodity in all of world history, preceded only by grain. In the Ottoman Empire in particular, the sale and exchange of silks, cottons, and woolens generated an immense amount of revenue and touched every level of society, from rural women tending silkworms to pashas flaunting layers of watered camlet to merchants traveling to Mecca and beyond. Sea Change offers the first comprehensive history of the Ottoman textile sector, arguing that the trade's enduring success resulted from its openness to expertise and objects from far-flung locations. Amanda Phillips skillfully marries art history with social and economic history, integrating formal analysis of various textiles into wider discussions of how trade, technology, and migration impacted the production and consumption of textiles in the Mediterranean from around 1400 to 1800. Surveying a vast network of textile topographies that stretched from India to Italy and from Egypt to Iran, Sea Change illuminates often neglected aspects of material culture, showcasing the objects' ability to tell new kinds of stories.

This book, first published in 1992, is a study of the development of Barcelona's cotton industry from its origins in calico-printing in 1728 to its introduction of steampower in 1832. It thus describes the experiences of the leading industry of the city, and one which provides the only Mediterranean exception to the tendency of early industrialization to be concentrated in northern Europe. The book bridges the 'pre-industrial' and early 'industrial' periods, offering answers to such questions as: what caused 'merchant capital' to move into industrial investment? what were the links between 'pre-industrial' industrial activity and industrialization proper? is it apt to refer to the economic changes of these years as an 'industrial revolution'? should industrialization be studied on a regional or a national basis? A further purpose is to provide an interpretation of the characteristics of the Catalan economy and of its relationship to that of Spain as a whole thereby contributing to the understanding of the 'Catalan question'.

In this study of salt production and trade, Professor Lovejoy examines the interaction between ecology, technology and social structure as a means of analysing the organisation of the salt industry of the Sokoto Caliphate and Borno. By concentrating on the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Lovejoy is able to establish a base-line from which to interpret earlier changes in the salt trade and thereby assess the impact of politics and economy on the history of the trade. By the end of the nineteenth century, production depended upon a combination of slavery, free migrant peasants, and workers from the haddad artisan caste. A complex marketing network serviced the various salines, although this network was intimately connected with the distribution of other commodities, especially textiles, grain and livestock. An examination of this marketing system reveals patterns of immigration and social advancement that are important in understanding the social history of the central Sudan.

How did small European economies acquire the technologies and skills needed to industrialize in the nineteenth century? In this important contribution to a long-standing debate, Kristine Bruland looks at the Norwegian experience to show how a technological infrastructure was created, and suggests that much of this was due to the efforts of British machine makers who from the mid 1840s vigorously sought foreign markets. Providing not only basic technical services but also skilled labour to set up and then supervise the operation of the new machinery, British textile engineering firms were able to supply a complete ‘package’ of services, significantly easing the initial technical problems faced by Norwegian entrepreneurs. Kristine Bruland’s case-study of the Norwegian textile industry demonstrates clearly the paradox that Britain’s entrepreneurial efforts in the supply of capital goods overseas were largely responsible for the creation of the technical industrial bases of many of her major foreign competitors.

Cloth was one of the most important commodities in the early modern world, and colonial North Americans had to develop creative strategies to acquire it. Although early European settlers came from societies in which hand textile production was central to the economy, local conditions in North America interacted with traditional craft structures to create new patterns of production and consumption. The Weaver's Craft examines the development of cloth manufacture in early Pennsylvania from its roots in seventeenth-century Europe to the beginning of industrialization. Adrienne D. Hood's focus on Pennsylvania and the long sweep of history yields a new understanding of the complexities of early American fabric production and the regional variations that led to distinct experiences of industrialization. Drawing on an extensive array of primary sources, combined with a quantitative approach, the author argues that in contrast to New England, rural Pennsylvania women spun the yarn that a small group of trained male artisans wove into cloth on a commercial basis throughout the eighteenth century. Their production was considerably augmented by consumers purchasing cheap cloth from Europe and Asia, making them active participants in a global marketplace. Hood's painstaking research and numerous illustrations of textile equipment, swatch books, and consumer goods will be of interest to both scholars and craftspeople.

Doing business in China is tougher than you think. Not only is the culture vastly different, but China's experience in manufacturing is still developing. It will be a few years before the majority of manufacturers are up to world standards. In the meantime, quality, contract laws, schedules and logistics must be closely monitored. As a result, the things Westerners must do to be successful are far different from dealing with American or European manufacturers. The best way to quickly come up to speed on these differences and how to handle them is to learn from the experience of others.

Through over 20 extraordinary executive interviews, Rosemary Coates captured the essence of sourcing and manufacturing in China. '42 Rules for Sourcing and Manufacturing in China (2nd Edition)' is a pragmatic approach that every businessperson headed to China must read.

For business people who are experienced in doing business in China, or for first-time visitors, this book will provide valuable insights from real executives and experts. These executives offer their personal experiences and recommendations about sourcing and manufacturing in China. Going beyond simple cultural do's and don'ts, you will discover: how business is really done how you can make things happen in China the mistake westerners often make, and how to avoid them what made these executives successful

Based on her 25 years of supply chain experience, much of it spent living and working across Asia, Rosemary Coates has become an expert on doing business in China. Her own personal experiences in China are interwoven into this book.

Before the Luddites is a study of the early Industrial Revolution in the English woollen cloth-making industry in the West of England and Yorkshire which concentrates upon the social background of and response to change. It is particularly concerned to explain the reasons for and the effect of Luddism. This book argues that resistance to machinery had a long history before the Luddite disturbances of 1811–12 and that this response to change sprang from a community culture which was deep-rooted and hostile to the values of economic individualism embodied by the new economy and to laissez-faire.

In a significant new contribution to economic history, Dr. Magee examines an important British industry that, like many others, declined in relative importance during the period prior to 1914. He compares Britain's performance in papermaking with its main international rivals of the time, America and Germany, addressing such central subjects as technological change, entrepreneurship and productivity. The book will be invaluable to scholars of economic history as well as those simply interested in papermaking.

The second installment of the "Fisher Investments On" series is a comprehensive guide to the Materials sector. "Fisher Investments on Materials" can benefit both new and seasoned investors, covering everything from Materials sector basics to specific industry insights to practical investing tactics, including common pitfalls to avoid.

The book will begin with a discussion of Fisher Investments' investing philosophy as it applies to the Materials sector. Then, readers will be lead through a discussion of sector basics, what drives the industries, and develop a framework for individual security analysis. Finally, the book will look at industry fundamentals and discuss what investors can do to protect themselves in a down market.

For more information visit www. materials.fisherinvestments.com

This book explores the long term forces shaping business attitudes in the British and American cotton industries from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. Mary Rose traces the social, political and developmental differences of the two nations, and examines local and regional networks, changing competitive environments, and community characteristics. She demonstrates how firms become embedded in networks, and evolve according to business values and strategies. An important contribution to comparative business history, this book will be of interest to graduates and scholars in all areas of business and economic history.