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The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether and how auditors’ pricing decisions are affected by their clients’ offshore trading activities, which are comprehensively measured through a textual analysis technique.

The authors identified a sample of 32,264 firm-year observations from publicly listed firms in the US during 2004 to 2015. The authors then used multivariate regressions to examine the effect of offshore trading activities on audit fees. In the regression models, the authors also control for a series of factors that are documented to influence audit pricing.

The authors find that offshore trading activities are positively associated with audit fees, suggesting that offshore activities are likely to increase a client firm’s business risk and/or the extent of client complexity. The authors also find that auditors charge higher audit fees only to firms purchasing inputs produced by their own assets overseas but not to firms buying inputs produced by local firms overseas. Moreover, the association between offshore trading activities and audit fees is more pronounced for offshore activities that are in countries with high trading centrality, for Big 4 auditors, or for auditors with industry expertise.

This paper extends the literature on the consequences of offshore activities by providing evidence on how auditors react to offshore activities. Moreover, it contributes to the audit fee literature. Prior studies largely focus on client-level determinants, while this study complements this line of literature by identifying firm’s offshore activities as an important risk indicator, which is perceived by auditors in their pricing decisions. A firm’s offshore activity is unique because the risk implication of the offshore activities depends not only on factors within the firm, but also on factors outside the firm in foreign nations.

The offshore supply vessel (OSV) industry is critical to offshore oil and gas operations around the world and contributes to the economic and ecological impacts experienced by the local communities supporting the offshore oil and gas industries. The OSV industry has not been studied significantly and the economic and ecological impacts to local communities is generally unknown. This paper aims to address these issues.

In this paper, the authors review the activities and logistical requirements involved in offshore exploration and development with special attention paid to workflows and the manner in which service vessels are utilized in the Gulf of Mexico. The authors estimate the OSV needs per stage of activity for offshore operations based on data collected from company planning documents, fleet utilization data from oil and gas companies and service providers, interviews and surveys. The statistical data is synthesized and reconciled and despite large variances the data sources are in reasonable agreement. Empirical data on circuit factors are also provided. The applications and limitations of the analyses are discussed.

In the US GOM, a large variety of marine vessels transport goods and provide services to exploration, development and production activity. OSVs provide a vital link between offshore E&P activities and shore‐based facilities. Offshore oil and gas operations cannot function without them and their utilization and spatial distribution provide a way of understanding the impacts of the offshore oil and gas industry on coastal communities.

This is the first empirical analysis of any offshore service vessel industry. The data presented here can be used to predict the environmental, economic, public health, and infrastructural consequences of alternative offshore development policies.

Offshoring has been studied widely in the literature on strategic management and international business. However, apart from its consideration as an administrative activity, scant attention has been paid to the offshoring of the human resource (HR) function. Research in this regard has instead focussed on outsourcing (Reichel and Lazarova, 2013). The purpose of this paper is to achieve a better understanding of companies’ decisions to offshore HR activities. It adapts the outsourcing model of Baron and Kreps (1999) by including the HR offshoring phenomenon and a dynamic perspective.

While the analysis is mostly conceptual, the authors ground the author’s arguments in offshoring data from the Offshoring Research Network, to explore whether the drivers for offshoring HR differ from the drivers for offshoring other administrative activities. The idiosyncrasy of the HR function is supported by the authors’ exploratory analysis and also by the descriptive case of a multinational and its experience with offshoring.

A coevolutionary model is proposed for understanding the behaviour of companies offshoring their HR activities. This study contends that companies should address their decision to offshore HR activities from a dynamic perspective, being aware of three processes that are in constant change: the evolution of the HR function, the evolution of service providers, and the evolution of offshoring decisions.

This study seeks to make a threefold contribution to the international business, strategy, and HR management disciplines.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the motivations for offshore outsourcing encountered by manufacturing small and medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) and their suppliers in China. The paper explores the motivations and challenges encountered by SMEs choosing to outsource their manufacturing activities and why their suppliers engage with them.

A qualitative case study method was utilized. The authors obtained perspectives of SME managers as well as the suppliers for each of the cases, conducting in‐depth interviews in order to obtain comprehensive information about their outsourcing activities. Then, cross‐case analysis was carried out using content analysis techniques to identify key themes for the motivations to undertake offshore outsourcing.

The results showed that the first rationale for offshore outsourcing relates to increasing efficiency and labor cost reduction while holding quality constant. The second rationale is to maintain flexibility in resource allocation providing both manufacturing SMEs and their suppliers with an opportunity to enter new markets. For both manufacturing firms and their suppliers building a relationship through networks and alliances was the key to the success (learning orientation) of the partnership.

The managerial implications of the findings are that first, from the perspective of client firms, the most important factor for success in manufacturing offshore outsourcing was maintaining good relationships with suppliers. The benefits of having close relationships with suppliers for outsourcing firms helped them to secure the quality of their products. The second managerial implication is from the perspective of the supplier firms. Supplier firms which were also aware of the transaction cost implications of their delivery while improving their own international image by supplying international clients. The evidence supplied suggests that supplier firms can benefit from using networks to assist them to gain international exposure.

While there are numerous studies on offshore outsourcing by multinational enterprises (MNEs) and large enterprises, there are relatively fewer studies on manufacturing offshore outsourcing by SMEs. Using the three theoretical lenses of the transaction cost approach, the core competences and the alliances, networks and internationalization approach, the paper offers insights on the reasons for and outcomes of a group of SMEs decision to undertake offshoring‐manufacturing activities in China. Also, the paper examines the manufacturing offshore outsourcing issues from the perspective of the suppliers to these SMEs.

The purpose of this paper is: to determine how offshore outsourcing firms in the USA are involved in providing assistance to education and training the downsized/unemployed; and to conduct inter‐industry comparisons among offshore outsourcing firms to determine if there are differences in their degree of involvement in assisting education and training the downsized/unemployed.

This research is based on a survey of 51 firms in the USA that are listed as major offshore outsourcers and exporters of American jobs in “CNN's Lou Dobbs Exporting America website”.

The findings show that out of eight areas of corporate social activities included in the survey, offshore outsourcing firms indicated that they were least involved in providing or supporting training programs to the downsized/unemployed. However, we also found that offshore outsourcing firms were highly involved in providing assistance to charities and supporting private and public education.

The response rate in this survey was similar to other response rates for research conducted on similar topics. However, the sample size for the study is relatively small and results from larger sample sizes are required to make empirical generalizations with confidence.

The findings of this study are useful for USA policy makers who are dealing with the negative effects of offshoring. It also provides direction to offshoring firms on how to alleviate negative attitudes toward offshore outsourcing.

The paper is the first to investigate the contributions of offshore outsourcing firms to education and training the downsized/unemployed as part of their corporate social responsibility. Thus, it makes a significant contribution to the literature.

Purpose – The purpose of the chapter is to analyze the factors that lead firms to offshore advanced tasks.

Methodology/approach – The study uses a 1,500-firm survey from Denmark to investigate the offshoring of 12 tradable manufacturing, technical, and service activities across different industries.

Findings – Findings indicate that offshoring of advanced tasks is driven by a different set of strategic motives than previous waves of offshoring, which predominantly included simple and standardized routine tasks. While the lower cost of unskilled, labor-intensive processes is the incentive for firms that offshore less advanced tasks, a desire to broaden and deepen global networks of new knowledge spurs highly knowledge-intensive companies to offshore more advanced tasks.

Originality/value of chapter – We propose that offshoring should be analyzed on a more disaggregated level of analysis than is the norm in mainstream offshoring literature. To reflect the trend whereby firms are “slicing” their value chain in finer and finer parts and locate these in various locations around the world, offshoring should be analyzed at the task level, since this paves the way for a richer understanding of offshoring strategies and processes.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships between the magnitude of job offshoring and organizational contingencies, including total number of employees, multinationality, business diversification, and relevancy of business activities.

Previous studies on job offshoring were restricted in descriptive and prescriptive understanding of the phenomena. Utilizing secondary data, this paper provides empirical findings on the magnitude of job offshoring from an organizational contingency perspective.

The results indicate that larger and multinational firms tend to offshore a larger number of jobs, and less diversified firms tend to offshore a higher ratio of jobs. Also, firms that offshore their core business activities are more likely to move a higher ratio of jobs to offshore destinations.

This paper reveals some of the key organizational factors that account for the magnitude of job offshoring within American firms.

The findings offer insights in what the government, the society, the workforce need to prepare for future changes and the globalization of business.

The paper offers empirical explanations of the magnitude of job offshoring. Various governmental, private, and international institutions may rely on the findings in making political, commercial, and social policies and decisions.

The principle of offshore financial confidentiality is a controversial issue in offshore law. On the one hand, offshore jurisdictions view confidentiality in financial matters as an essential ingredient in the offshore industry which deserves to be protected. On the other, onshore states are increasingly hostile to confidentiality and have been willing to take drastic measures to undermine it.

The purpose of this paper is to enhance our understanding of managerial decision‐making process regarding offshore sourcing of information technology (IT) projects. The study explored the relationship between transaction cost economics and maturity levels of a firm's offshore sourcing activities. Transactions costs theory and firms' offshore sourcing maturity levels provided the framework for studying the decision process.

The present study is a qualitative empirical investigation of the underlying decision process to offshore IT projects. The study is based on interviews of executives in fifteen large to medium size companies.

The data suggest that transaction cost mitigation approaches used by a firm vary based on the size of the company as well as the maturity level of the firm's offshore sourcing activities.

The present study is based on interviews of IT executives in fifteen firms. Case studies and confirmatory studies can provide further insights.

Offshore sourcing maturity can influence cost mitigation tactics used by managers.

This is the first study to explore the relationship between transactions cost economics and offshore sourcing maturity of a firm. Future studies can extend the findings to deepen our knowledge of offshore sourcing challenges.

This paper aims to shed light on how offshore wind park business networks can orchestrate dynamic capabilities to enable innovation for the competitive advantage of renewable offshore wind energy.

The research is based on a qualitative multiple-case study of operation and maintenance activities in offshore wind parks, starting in June 2014 with a pilot qualitative case study and the main qualitative multiple-case research conducted via in-depth interviews with 20 enterprises. The preliminary findings were presented for the qualitative triangulation of comments in a seminar in May 2015.

The findings explain the need for collaboration across the business network through the use of an open innovation platform for orchestrating dynamic signature capabilities in combination with ordinary capabilities. Both locally distributed leadership and central leadership in knowledge creation are necessary ingredients. The model developed from the research findings shows the need to change the competitive advantage criteria within business networks to VRIS (valuable, rare, imitable, substitutable) in contrast to the traditional criteria for individual enterprises of VRIN (valuable, rare, imperfectly imitable, non-substitutable).

The research is focused on offshore wind park business networks, and therefore, the generalizability of this qualitative case study to other contexts can be limited. Further research is thus needed to verify the findings.

A three-fold contribution is made to the understanding of the integrated combination of orchestrating dynamic capabilities in the offshore wind energy sector. Business networks, academia and policy bodies are given a model for enacting the competitive advantage of renewable offshore wind energy for the benefit of society.