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Multinational companies marketing their undifferentiated products to different countries unintentionally may create a problem for themselves. A low price in one country may encourage an enterprise to transship the products to another country with higher price, creating a new channel of parallel imports that competes with the authorized channels there. By setting prices reflecting differences in willingness to pay in the different countries, multinational firms are “setting” prices for their products in separable channels. In light of this problem of parallel import channels competing with the authorized channels, multinationals need to carefully establish their pricing strategies for the global marketplace.

Lao PDR, as the sole land‐locked country in South East Asia, is dependent upon available infrastructure in neighbouring countries for fast and efficient import of goods. The validity of a cost model for multimodal transport, which was originally proposed by Beresford and Dubey (1990) and developed by Beresford (1999), is tested against a real case in international logistics, namely the import of wine from Marseilles in France to Vientiane in Lao PDR. The main elements of the model are as follows: cost, time, distance, transport mode and intermodal transfer. The model is tested using real data over a series of alternative routes between Marseilles and Vientiane. The selection of appropriate international logistics system will have a direct impact on the efficiency of Lao PDR import channels. The research findings clearly demonstrate that the “sea‐road” combination via Danang Port in Vietnam is the most competitive in terms of costs while the “sea‐rail‐road” option via port Klang in Malaysia and through Thailand offers the fastest transit time.

Develops an additional theoretical extension on channel decisions to the basic transaction cost model (TCM) by combining insights from production economy and industrial structure analysis methods with the existing TCM approach. The data for this study were obtained from survey questionnaires of 119 importing firms in Korea. The empirical results showed that production economy and industrial structure approach with previous TCM extended explanatory power of research model on channel style decisions.

The global financial crisis hit the economy of the Kyrgyz Republic by the third wave of its transmission in early 2009. The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of the global financial economic crisis on the transition economy of the Kyrgyz Republic. As there is a low level of the Kyrgyz Republic’s integration into the global financial and economic processes, it is obvious that channels of transmissions are different.

The empirical model is the vector autoregression approach. The quarterly data from 2005 to 2013 of the remittances from abroad, trade volumes, exchange rates, credits, deposits and liquidity of the banking system, gross domestic product (GDP) and foreign direct investment (FDI) were used in the empirical analysis.

The authors found a significant positive relation between transmission channels such as remittances flow, banking sector, international trade and GDP within the first six months. Thus, a decline in the aforementioned variables has a significant affirmative effect on the country’s GDP. Notwithstanding, the exchange-rate channel adversely influences GDP. Thereby, the depreciation of the national currency leads to an increase in GDP.

The study findings allow the Kyrgyz policymakers to foresee the global crisis transmission through the primary channels of transmission mechanism. Nevertheless, a decrease of the deposit level by 1 per cent leads to 2.91 per cent decline in FDI inflows. On the contrary, an increase of the exchange rate by 1 per cent leads to 1.54 per cent decrease in imports.

Imports of cut roses increased after Norway implemented a preferential tariff scheme for the least developed countries in 2002. When the scheme was extended to more countries in 2008 – among them Kenya – imports exploded. This article studies the subsequent changes in supply channels, import costs and the way Norwegian firms imported.

Qualitative data, obtained through interviews among five rose importers, are combined with quantitative data for all importing firms and transactions in Norway for the years 2003–2014. These data are analysed in light of recent economic theories on international trade.

When Kenya was included in the scheme, imports from Europe and domestic production in Norway decreased substantially. Imports from some African countries with low income levels also declined. Importing under GSP involves high fixed import costs due to stringent procedures. Each firm's imports increased gradually, and over time learning may have facilitated importing. Direct trade with African producers and control over the logistics chain seem to have become more important.

The analysis builds mainly on data for Norwegian importers, not for African exporters.

Simplifying the GSP procedures could increase Norwegian imports from developing countries and induce establishment of new trade relationships, perhaps also for other products than roses.

Using a mixture of original qualitative data as well as unique, detailed and comprehensive quantitative data, the article provides new insights into how preferential tariff reductions for developing countries’ exports to a developed country affect trade and buyer–supplier relationships.

The purpose of this paper is to study how proximity affects the trade-migration link. By focusing on two case studies, France and Egypt, the authors explore if migrants promote and help to deal with market heterogeneity in international markets. Using an ethnic network approach the authors also test for interactions between the characteristics of migrants and proximity issues.

The paper builds on two case studies to illustrate the main working hypotheses. The main framework is that of ethnic networks, proximity ties, and market heterogeneity. Static and dynamic panel data methods are employed when estimating extended gravity trade equations. The authors account for country-pair fixed effects and instrument by lagged stocks of migrants, in order to deal with bilateral commonalities and endogeneity issues in the estimation procedure.

The paper provides evidence on how proximity enhances trade. Additional trade effects are found for countries sharing closer ties. Networks of migrants appear to help firms to deal with fixed trade costs, also generating some market heterogeneity that at the end influences the trade-migration linkage. Characteristics of migrants also seem to matter, interacting with proximity issues, and resulting in specific trade effects.

Proximity issues seem to matter in the trade creation effects of networks of migrants. In this way integration processes between countries would be showing some positive externalities in the side of trade flows. Characteristics of emigrants should be taken into account when defining migratory policies, mainly for the education and assimilation issues.

The paper get deeper insights in some emerging issues in the trade-migration literature by focusing in two relevant case studies.

Conformal cooling channels in additively manufactured molds are superior over conventional channels in terms of cooling control, part warpage and lead time. The heat transfer ability of cooling channels is determined by their geometry and surface roughness. Laser powder bed fusion manufactured channels have an inherent process-induced dross formation that may significantly alter the actual shape of nominal channels. Therefore, it is crucial to be able to predict the expected surface roughness and changes in the geometry of metal additively manufactured conformal cooling channels. The purpose of this paper is to present a new methodology for predicting the realistic design of laser powder bed fusion channels.

This study proposes a methodology for making nominal channel design more realistic by the implementation of roughness prediction models. The models are used for altering the nominal shape of a channel to its predicted shape by point cloud analysis and manipulation.

A straight channel is investigated as a simple case study and validated against X-ray computed tomography measurements. The modified channel geometry is reconstructed and meshed, resulting in a predicted, more realistic version of the nominal geometry. The methodology is successfully tested on a torus shape and a simple conformal cooling channel design. Finally, the methodology is validated through a cooling test experiment and comparison with simulations.

Accurate prediction of channel surface roughness and geometry would lead toward more accurate modeling of cooling performance.

A robust start to finish method for realistic geometrical prediction of metal additive manufacturing cooling channels has yet to be proposed. The current study seeks to fill the gap.

The purpose of this paper is to track the financial performance of manufacturing firms at different levels of their conditional quantiles. It also analyzes the relevance of revenue and cost channels along with key firm-specific parameters that influence firm’s profitability.

The study analyses a sample of 1,000 manufacturing firms over a study period spanning from 2000 to 2016. It uses both quantile regression and panel ordinary linear square (OLS) models to analyze the financial performance of the firms.

The study finds large scale of heterogeneity among the firms under different quantiles of profitability. Export earnings, firm size, asset turnover and volatility of exchange rate are the decisive determinants of financial performance across all quantiles. Financing assets by current debt is negatively impacting return on assets and return on capital employed of firms from lower quantile whereas profitability is positively impacted if they are financed by long term debt. Debt financing of assets does not make any sense for firms with high quantile of profitability. The study also finds that quantile regression approach is a better method than panel OLS models in the presence of highly heterogeneous and non-normal distributions.

This study is limited to the financial performance of manufacturing firms and does not consider service sector which is also equally competitive. However, a sector wise analysis of firm’s profitability could be more meaningful than comparing all the firms in one basket of manufacturing domain.

The research findings have both practical as well as policy implications. Practically, the study helps the firm managers to identify critical success factors that significantly influence firm’s financial performance at different levels of profitability. It also helps the policy makers to align policy focus to stabilize firms at lower level of profitability and also to manage conducive business environment for all firms at different levels of their profitability.

The study provides a deep theoretical underpinning of literatures on firm’s financial performance and empirically investigates it using advanced methodology. The robust estimates of the study ensure to analyze financial performance under revenue and cost channels at diverse level of their profitability.