This book focuses on Iran to explore the question of how the nature of industrial organizations and the whole system they constitute can exert a great influence on an industry's competitiveness and resilience. The author examines what happens if firms and companies participating in the manufacturing and distribution process of a certain product are not organized to a high degree and operate independently. The book begins with an inquiry into the historical environment of Iran's apparel industry, which has never been stable. It then reveals the specific practices that enable firms to maintain their independent business, and argues that the elastic state of the production and distribution system has worked for the survival of self-reliant member firms. The typical Iranian apparel firm persists in maintaining independent operations regardless of its size, a practice that is inimical to the development of long-lasting business relations with other firms as well as to vertical integration between firms, in all stages from production to distribution. A distinguishing feature of Iran's apparel industry is that the member firms are barely organized compared with their counterparts in advanced industrialized countries. Despite such a weakly organized system, generally small-scale but self-reliant Iranian firms courageously persist in the face of the market's difficulties. Superficially, it appears that Iran's apparel market is being filled with Chinese goods, but the reality is somewhat different. Apparel firms that are currently doing business with China but are ready to terminate it at any time are taking advantage of newly emerging opportunities to ensure the survival of their own businesses. Reopening those businesses for domestic operations remains an ever-present possibility for them.

This book takes a comprehensive look at Japanese firms engaging in export and foreign direct investment (FDI) and develops new methods and data to investigate the internationalization of firms, which is a focus issue in international trade. Using micro-level data, the book provides an introduction to theoretical and statistical analysis of internationalization modes of Japanese firms with productivity heterogeneity. It makes clear that although the productivity of internationalized Japanese firms is higher on average than that of firms serving only the domestic market, the difference in productivity between exporters and FDI firms is not as obvious in comparison with that of their counterparts in the United States and Europe. Focusing on this point, the book analyzes not only productivity heterogeneity among firms, but also the differences in firm-specific factors other than productivity: industry-specific factors, market-specific factors such as market size and variable and fixed costs for export, and FDI in destination countries. This in-depth investigation reveals how those factors make the modes of Japanese firms' internationalization different from those in the United States and Europe. Further analysis focuses on the effects of match quality, organizational and institutional factors in the market on firms' exports, and FDI. As an approach to the current trends in international trade, this book is unique in using detailed firm-level panel data drawn from Japanese government statistics.

​This publication provides insight into the agricultural sector. It illustrates new tendencies in agricultural economics and dynamics (interrelationship with other sectors in rural zones and multifunctionality) and the implications of the World Trade Organization negotiations in the international trade of agricultural products. Due to environmental problems, availability of budget, consumer preferences for food safety and pressure from the World Trade Organization, there are many changes in the agricultural sector. This book addresses those new developments and provides insights into possible future developments. The agricultural activity is an economic sector that is fundamental for a sustainable economic growth of every country. However, this sector has many particularities, namely those related with some structural problems (many farms with reduced dimension, sometimes lack of vocational training of the farmers, difficulties of put the farmers together in associations and cooperatives), variations of the productions and prices over the year and some environmental problems derived from the utilization of pesticides and fertilizers.

This book analyzes the current economic situations in African countries at the local, regional, and national level. It examines the growing interest from developed and developing countries to invest in Africa and their different reasons for doing so, which aren't always aligned with the interests of African countries. Growth in African GDP has benefitted mainly multinational corporations while the rest of the population remains at the subsistence level, creating a smaller middle class and less opportunity for local businesses to flourish. This book offers potential models of cooperation which could create added value for both African countries and the MNCs investing in them.

The authors describe in detail what makes today's online retailing different and provide 8 central success factors for the new generation of Internet sales. Based on internationally recognized best practices, it becomes obvious what makes online retailers successful. The authors pull together "lessons learned" from the last 10 years, and give readers a tour of the future of online selling.

The first book focusing specifically on talent management, retention and leadership in the luxury industry. It explores how to lead and manage the people this industry attracts, and the major HR challenges the industry is about to face as the previous generation of luxury pioneers retire and Asia becomes a major player in the luxury world.

Brand Revolution offers a radical new approach to brand management. With big brand case studies including L'Oreal and Jaguar, the author draws on her extensive experience as a marketing consultant to put together this highly engaging and practical book for developing, improving and controlling the identity of your brand.

Written by experts in Luxury and Fashion Management at SKEMA Business School this exciting new book offers a new perspective that challenges the established rules of the luxury and fashion industry. The authors and contributors examine the evolution of luxury strategy and how the luxury industry is being redefined in the twenty-first century.

In the fall of 1990, the Danish government started a comprehensive research pro gramme to improve the competitiveness of the Danish food sector: The Research and Development Programme in the Danish Food Sector (Det F Ildevareteknologiske Forsk nings- og Udviklingsprogram, F0TEK). The programme was based on a combination of basic research to be carried out by universities and other research institutions, and a series of collaboration projects between researchers and food companies. The programme was originally designed as a technological research programme. However, in the planning phases of the research programme, the view that the development of new technologies and products may not be sufficient to improve competitiveness made some ground. A small comer of the overall research effort was therefore set aside for market-oriented research. This comer was filled by the research programme Market-based process and product innovation in the food sector (MAPP). MAPP was a joint research programme in which researchers from several Danish universities and business schools participated; it was coordinated by the Aarhus School of Business. MAPP set out to achieve a difficult task: to conduct high quality research on various aspects of the marketing of food products, to do so in cooperation with food companies, and to win under standing and recognition from the colleagues in the food technology departments."

In the time-worn traditions of the transportation industry, ship pers and carriers regard one another as enemies. There is, to be sure, a certain degree of validity to such a viewpoint. An element of conflict will naturally be present in any vendor-purchaser relationship. The two, after all, are seeking distinctly different things from that relationship; and to a con siderable extent each party's success in realizing its own goals must be achieved at the expense of the other. At the same time, however, viewing that relationship as strictly zero-sum-a gain by one side always resulting in an equal and offsetting loss by the other-is a gross misconception. It overlooks the key reality that, no matter which party comes closest to its own objectives, the relationship, and the business transactions that flow from it, must ultimately benefit both. Without that level of mutual benefit the relationship will simply not exist (or will soon founder if it somehow does come into being); for it is only the self-interest of the two parties that impels them to establish and continue that relationship at all. In transportation, however, this element of mutuality-the attitude that the parties share a common interest in nurturing their relationship-is often forgotten. Instead of working to gether as, fundamentally, partners in a business transaction from which both expect to derive gains, they dedicate the bulk of their energies to fighting, rather than cooperating, with one another."

The internet and the electronic economy are a technological revolution whose secular importance is apparent. The internet eliminates the temporal and spatial constraints on the exchange of information. It changes deeply the world of production and of labour. It transforms the exchange relationships between producers and consumers as well as between the suppliers within the supply-chain. The electronic economy is able to generate more accurate con sumer profiles and, therefore, a more powerful and effective marketing di rected to the individual consumer. There is no industry that is not undergoing thorough changes caused by the internet. The volume at hand gives an analysis of the internet revolution. It covers questions reaching form the highly controversial thesis of the end of property rights in the internet caused by the non-rivalry of the "consumption" of in formation to questions regarding the repercussions of the internet on our understanding of the human person. Technological changes like the introduction of the electronic economy pose the question of how to handle it and how to manage reasonably its ethi cal problems and dilemmas. The ethical problems and the business ethics of the electronic economy in the fields of production and labour, of consump tion, and in handling trust and the abuse of trust are analysed by the contribu tions from applied ethics and business ethics."

ED-L2L, Learning to Live in the Knowledge Society, is one of the co-located conferences of the 20th World Computer Congress (WCC2008). The event is organized under the auspices of IFIP (International Federation for Information Processing) and is to be held in Milan from 7th to 10th September 2008. ED-L2L is devoted to themes related to ICT for education in the knowledge society. It provides an international forum for professionals from all continents to discuss research and practice in ICT and education. The event brings together educators, researchers, policy makers, curriculum designers, teacher educators, members of academia, teachers and content producers. ED-L2L is organised by the IFIP Technical Committee 3, Education, with the support of the Institute for Educational Technology, part of the National Research Council of Italy. The Institute is devoted to the study of educational innovation brought about through the use of ICT. Submissions to ED-L2L are published in this conference book. The published papers are devoted to the published conference themes: Developing digital literacy for the knowledge society: information problem solving, creating, capturing and transferring knowledge, commitment to lifelong learning Teaching and learning in the knowledge society, playful and fun learning at home and in the school New models, processes and systems for formal and informal learning environments and organisations Developing a collective intelligence, learning together and sharing knowledge ICT issues in education - ethics, equality, inclusion and parental role Educating ICT professionals for the global knowledge society Managing the transition to the knowledge society

Ontologies have been developed and investigated for some time in artificial intelligence to facilitate knowledge sharing and reuse. More recently, the notion of ontologies has attracted attention from fields such as databases, intelligent information integration, cooperative information systems, information retrieval, electronic commerce, enterprise application integration, and knowledge management. This broadened interest in ontologies is based on the feature that they provide a machine-processable semantics of information sources that can be communicated among agents as well as between software artifacts and humans. This feature makes ontologies the backbone technology of the next web generation, i.e., the Semantic Web. Ontologies are currently applied in areas such as knowledge management in large company-wide networks and call centers, and in B2C, B2G, and B2B electronic commerce. In a nutshell, ontologies enable effective and efficient access to heterogeneous and distributed information sources. Given the increasing amount of information available online, this kind of support is becoming more important day by day.

The author systematically introduces the notion of ontologies to the non-expert reader and demonstrates in detail how to apply this conceptual framework for improved intranet retrieval of corporate information and knowledge and for enhanced Internet-based electronic commerce. He also describes ontology languages (XML, RDF, and OWL) and ontology tools, and the application of ontologies.

In addition to structural improvements, the second edition covers recent developments relating to the Semantic Web, and emerging web-based standard languages.

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International trade was of great importance for the Ottomans in the construction of their empire. Kate Fleet's book examines the trade links which existed between European merchants and their Muslim counterparts from the beginnings of the Ottoman empire in 1300 to the fall of Constantinople in 1453. By using previously unexploited Latin and Turkish sources, and by focusing on the trading partnership between the Genoese and the Turks, she demonstrates how this interaction contributed to the economic development of the early Ottoman state and, indeed, to Ottoman territorial expansion. Where other studies have emphasized the military prowess of the early Ottoman state and its role as 'the infidel enemy', the book offers an insight into its economic aspirations and eventual integration into the economy of the Mediterranean basin. This is a readable, authoritative and innovative study which illuminates our understanding of an obscure period in early Ottoman history.

This book investigates the transfer of parent country organizational practices by the retailers to their Chinese subsidiaries, providing insights into employment relations in multinational retail firms and changing labour-management systems in China, as well as their impact on consumer culture.

China has become such an important element of the global economy that its influence cannot be ignored in almost any field of endeavour. The phenomenal impact of FDI in China and its (largely trade-related) consequences has been well documented and now there is a significant literature on the phenomenon of outward investment from China too. This book is an in depth study of the international business relationships of China covering both inward and outward foreign direct investment, its impact and related theoretical and policy issues. This volume of highly renowned author Peter Buckley's collected papers from 2005-8 continues his interest in the theory of international business (Section I) and policies towards foreign direct investment (FDI) (Section IV) but has a major concentration on China, both as regards outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) from China (Section II) and FDI in China (Section III).

Using a wide range of archival and written sources, Rudi Matthee considers the economic, social and political networks established between Iran, its neighbours and the world at large, through the prism of the late Safavid silk trade. In so doing, he demonstrates how silk, a resource crucial to state revenue and the only commodity to span Iran's entire economic activity, was integral to aspects of late Safavid society, including its approach to commerce, export routes and, importantly, to the political and economic problems which contributed to its collapse in the early 1700s. In a challenge to traditional scholarship, the author argues that despite the introduction of a maritime, western-dominated channel, Iran's traditional land-based silk export continued to expand right up to the end of the seventeenth century. The book makes a major theoretical contribution to the debates on the social and economic history of the pre-modern world.

The aim of EUROPEAN RETAIL RESEARCH is to publish interesting manuscripts of high quality and innovativeness with a focus on retail researchers, retail lecturers, retail students and retail executives. As it has always been, retail executives are part of the target group and the knowledge transfer between retail research and retail management remains a part of the publication's concept.

* Coming in 2017 as a Netflix Original Series, starring Britt Robertson.

In the "New York Times" bestseller that the "Washington Post" called "Lean In for misfits," Sophia Amoruso shares how she went from dumpster diving to founding one of the fastest-growing retailers in the world. Sophia Amoruso spent her teens hitchhiking, committing petty theft, and scrounging in dumpsters for leftover bagels. By age twenty-two she had dropped out of school, and was broke, directionless, and checking IDs in the lobby of an art school a job she d taken for the health insurance. It was in that lobby that Sophia decided to start selling vintage clothes on eBay.

Flash forward ten years to today, and she s the founder and executive chairman of Nasty Gal, a $250-million-plus fashion retailer with more than four hundred employees. Sophia was never a typical CEO, or a typical anything, and she s written "#GIRLBOSS" for other girls like her: outsiders (and insiders) seeking a unique path to success, even when that path is windy as all hell and lined with naysayers.

"#GIRLBOSS" proves that being successful isn t about where you went to college or how popular you were in high school. It s about trusting your instincts and following your gut; knowing which rules to follow and which to break; when to button up and when to let your freak flag fly."

Die jahrzehntelange Praxis des Autors als Management-Coach hat gezeigt: In den letzten funf Jahren ist die Verunsicherung grosser, das Vertrauen aber kleiner geworden. In dem Buch motiviert er Fuhrungskrafte und leitet sie an, das Vertrauen von Kunden, Geschaftspartnern und Mitarbeitern zuruckzugewinnen, zu pflegen und auszubauen. Der Autor zeigt, wo die Quellen des Erfolgs zu suchen sind. Der von ihm entwickelte Katalog an Massnahmen und Verhaltensweisen hilft Lesern, ihr Fuhrungs- und Kommunikationsverhalten zu prufen und weiterzuentwickeln."

Die Mobilfunkbranche steht vor ihrem n chsten Entwicklungssprung. Nachdem der mobile Sprachmarkt ges ttigt ist, richtet sich der Fokus auf neue Gesch ftsfelder wie der Markt f r mobiles Internet, mobile Datengesch fte und Anwendungen. Das Buch b ndelt aktuellste praxisrelevante und wissenschaftlich fundierte Erkenntnisse zu den Erfolgsfaktoren eines profitablen Mobile Marketings. Mit einem Grundlagenteil sowie Kapiteln zu den Marketinginstrumenten und den Besonderheiten des Marketingmanagements ist der Band von hohem Wert f r die Unternehmenspraxis.

Drawing on several interviews and a comprehensive statistical analysis, Alfred Angerer proves the effectiveness of such ASR systems. The following questions are adressed: Which types of ASR system exist? What are the exact benefits of ASR systems? Which variables influence the ASR performance? Which ASR system is best suited for each product?
How does a company best implement ASR systems?

In a challenge to the widespread belief that poverty and poor living standards have been characteristic of India for centuries, Prasannan Parthasarathi demonstrates that, until the late eighteenth century, laboring groups in South India were in a powerful position, receiving incomes well above subsistence. It was with the rise of colonial rule, the author maintains, that the decline in their economic fortunes was initiated. This is a powerful revisionist statement on the role of Britain in India that will interest students of the region, and economic and colonial historians.

Wie konnen sich Unternehmen andern und sich dabei treu bleiben? Es gibt viele Wege zum Erfolg, eines jedoch haben sie gemeinsam: Ihr Fokus liegt auf Change Communications (Veranderungskommunikation). In dem Buch wird die zentrale Aufgabe von Change Communications veranschaulicht, namlich die Kommunikation wahrend eines Veranderungsprozesses zu steuern, zu managen und zu gestalten. Pramierte Projekte (European Change Communications Award) werden detailliert vorgestellt und durch Expertenbeitrage zu den Themen Traditionen, Werte und Rituale erganzt."

In the last years electronic markets, especially online auctions, have become very popular and received more and more attention in both, business (B2B) as well as in public practice (B2C and C2C). Science, however, is still far from having studied all phenomena and effects which can be observed on electronic markets. Apart from theoretic analysis, other approaches are necessary to evaluate and understand market effects. This book shows that and how software agents can be used to simulate bidding behaviour in electronic auctions.

The main emphasis of this book is to apply computational economics to market theory. It summarizes the most common and up-to-date agent-based simulation methods and tools and develops the simulation software AMASE. On basis of the introduced methods a model is established to simulate bidding behaviour under uncertainty.

The book addresses researchers, computer scientists, economists and students who are interested in applying agent-based computational methods to electronic markets. It helps to learn more about simulations in economics in general and common agent-based methods and tools in particular. The reader finds basic definitions and learns how to build an appropriate model for the posed research question. It is the first time that quantitative results are presented for the problem of valuation uncertainty. These results significantly contribute to existing research in computational economics and supplements interesting research aspects.