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In Thailand, as in many other developing countries, a significant and coherent policy response to the challenges posed by climate change is just beginning to emerge. The initial emphasis was on meeting international reporting obligations and building a better understanding of the issues (OEPP, 2000). Most climate policy attention has focused on mitigation, in particular of the difficulties, and occasionally taking advantage of the opportunities, in decoupling growth in greenhouse gas emissions from social and economic development. While early concerns were expressed about impacts on water resources and agriculture, not much attention has been given to implementing specific adaptation measures.

This paper aims to evaluate the past contributions of Multinational Business Review (MBR), identify research gaps and opportunities and provide a research agenda that addresses several sustainability-related and other contemporary challenges.

This study analyzes 400 papers published between 2003 and 2021 to map the MBR’s intellectual and conceptual structure using advanced bibliometric techniques.

The bibliographic coupling technique identifies core clusters in MBR papers, and subsequent content analysis of these clusters reveals the following five research fronts: internalization theory and the future of international business (IB) research; internationalization and firm performance; regionalization versus globalization debate; internationalization by emerging market firms; and global dynamic capabilities and firm internationalization.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first comprehensive analysis of past contributions of MBR to research on IB and suggests a way for MBR to play a seminal role in addressing contemporary challenges in IB.

Russia is one of the fastest growing emerging economies and large Russian companies, mainly resource exporters, have entered the global markets in recent years. The internationalization process of Russian enterprises and its implications on foreign direct investment paradigms have attracted global interest. This paper studies the effect of internationalization on the performance of large Russian companies (state‐owned, privatized and de‐novo). The results show that international operations have a significant effect on company performance indicators. Companies with international operations have significantly higher profitability and labor productivity. However, profitability or labor productivity is not significantly higher in the early years of trade liberalization. The positive effects grow gradually with the integration of Russian companies to world markets. Specifically, the expansion of the de‐novo private sector has been strong.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of personality and individual differences as an antecedent to work-family enrichment (WFE) and consequently with job satisfaction. This study address gaps in WFE literature by looking at proactivity, work-family self-efficacy (WFSE) and family permeability as antecedent variables that have received scant attention from researchers. By addressing these gaps, the study seeks to advance theory on WFE and its relation to job satisfaction.

The authors do this through the exploration of pathways through WFE and studying 508 married individuals, with at least one child, working in the IT/ITES sector in India. The authors use structural equation modeling to analyze different pathways from personality based antecedents and WFE as mediator.

The results demonstrate the mediating role of WFE in the relationship between antecedents (WFSE, family permeability and proactive personality) and job satisfaction.

This study contributes to existing research on WFE and personality by showing that WFE is a significant pathway toward job satisfaction and how personality variables influence satisfaction.

It is also the first study to use proactivity and WFSE as antecedents to test out the influence of WFE on job satisfaction. This is also the first study to look at only married individuals with children in a WFE study forced on the services sector. Consequently, these findings have significant implications in the way organizations deal with work-life situations, especially in the 30+ age bracket in India.

This paper aims to examine the weak form of efficiency for price series of four precious metals, i.e. gold, silver, platinum and palladium, using a generalized spectral method.

The method has the advantage of detecting both linear and non-linear serial dependence in the conditional mean, and it is robust to various forms of conditional heteroscedasticity. The authors use three different rolling windows for the purpose of robustness.

The authors report weak form of efficiency across metals series for almost all rolling windows. The optimum efficiency for Gold and Palladium is achieved through 250 days rolling window estimates whereas it is 500 days rolling window for silver. Platinum has similar efficiency levels across rolling windows. The degree of efficiency for metal prices is observed to be varying over time with silver market possessing highest levels of efficiency. The efficiency synchronization also varies across rolling windows and metals.

The results reveal that metal markets are efficient for most times implying the low predictability and the low likelihood of earning abnormal returns by speculating in these markets.

The study uses a relatively new statistical technique, the generalized spectral test, to capture linear and non-linear serial dependence. Therefore, the results possess adequate power against departure from market efficiency.

This case study exposes students to conflicts with distributors, escalated scenarios of a trade association and the possible repercussions of such a scenario. Upon completion of this case study, the students will be able to understand the critical success factors for a distribution setup and alignment of channels for driving growth; understand and manage the power dynamics with a stakeholder, like trade associations, distribution reach, fallacies in managing the distributors and identifying the gaps; critically evaluate negotiation opportunities when a trade association is not directly related to the principal organization.

This case study showcased a conflict between the distributor and Universal Heater Industries (UHI), a leading player in the water heater business in India. In 2015, the global leadership of UHI identified India as an emerging market and undertook a complete management overhaul to implement a new growth plan. Several measures were put in place that leveraged the global product portfolio and new people were appointed to push the agenda. Manish Singhal, the national sales head of UHI, selected Kerala as the pilot state to implement the new plan. However, the projects failed, as the distributor escalated the treatment meted out by UHI to the Electrical Trade Association (ETA). Trade associations have had a history of playing truant with players like UHI, and because of this, business came to a complete halt. The UHI and ETA teams met once; however, the suggested closure by ETA needed to be aligned with UHI’s interests. Singhal’s dilemma deepened, and they had to decide the next steps.

This case study is suitable for a postgraduate marketing course in a segment on managing channels, intermediaries, distribution management and channel conflicts. The uniqueness of this case is in the dimension of the trade association and managing the stakeholders.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS8: Marketing.

The purpose of this paper is to study the challenges associated with big data analytics (BDA) in service supply chains in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

A comprehensive questionnaire has been developed based on semi-structured interviews with different administrators and IT experts. In the second phase, data (n=164) are collected from procurement, operations, administration and customer service staff in the UAE. In the third phase, responses are examined using principal component analysis to identify eight major challenges for big data. A structural model is developed to examine the significance of these dimensions to the notion of big data challenges in supply chains.

The statistical model shows 66 percent variance of response to BDA, which is caused by technical, cultural, ethical, operational, tactical, procedural, functional and organizational challenges. These are positively correlated measurement challenges with BDA in service supply chains.

Service supply chain professionals and stakeholders believe that catering to the challenges with BDA must be a multi-faceted approach and not limited to specific practices.

The challenges with BDA should be taken into planning and implementation from a holistic perspective. The framework in this paper can have both theoretical and practical implications.

The contribution of this paper is to advance the understanding of BDA in service sector by viewing it from the perspective of different stakeholders.