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This paper aims to understand how the different stakeholders assess the adequacy of smart specialization policies defined for their regions.

This paper has followed a quantitative methodology through the application of questionnaire surveys to stakeholders of the various territorial regions in Portugal.

As a result, from the “resource-based view” approach applied to the various regions, the attained results highlight that the suitability of smart specialization policies defined for the Portuguese regions is not unanimous among its stakeholders.

The research can be used as a tool to assist regional policymakers in strategic reflection when defining and adjusting smart specialization strategies in their territories.

Entrepreneurial ecosystems provide the context for start-ups to access resources. The authors investigate the reliance of start-ups on their entrepreneurial ecosystem and the driving factors behind the proportion of local actors (belonging to their entrepreneurial ecosystem) within their overall set of relationships (their business ecosystem). Recognizing the limited relational capacity of firms, the authors focus on three differentiating firm characteristics: size, age and innovation of firms.

The authors developed a sample of 163 start-ups located in the entrepreneurial ecosystem of Toulouse, France. The authors investigated the characteristics of their relationship sets using regression analysis.

The results confirm that age is inversely related to the proportion of a start-up's relationships located in its entrepreneurial ecosystem. More surprisingly, for older start-ups, the authors also highlight the presence of a moderating effect of the start-up's size on the relationship between its degree of innovation and the proportion of its relationships in its entrepreneurial ecosystem: Larger and more innovative start-ups appear to rely more on their local entrepreneurial ecosystem.

This research increases the understanding of the characteristics driving the interactions of start-ups with their entrepreneurial ecosystems by adopting a relational capacity approach. The authors introduce digital methods as an innovative approach for uncovering firms' ecosystems. Finally, from a practical point of view, the research should provide public authorities seeking to promote the link between local resources and the development of innovative start-ups in their regions with interesting insights.

The learning outcomes are as follows: to describe the possible problems in cross hierarchical and cross-functional coordination; to illustrate the month/year-end closing operations related issues at logistics and warehousing end; to analyze the importance of supply chain resilience/ contingency plan; and to compare the role of the tradeoff in decision-making: ethics (policies) vs operations.

Mr Azhar Ali working as a regional distribution manager was waiting for the finalization of sales orders, it was the last working day of the financial year. He had to fulfill all the orders to achieve his personal and organizational goals. He was excited as he was supposed to be promoted and transferred to Head Office on a national role, after a successful annual closing. It was not too late when his excitement turned into anxiety when he received a never expected direct call from Director Sales. Around 7:00 p.m., he was informed of some new orders for an important institutional customer, which was out of his own region. The orders were placed in Ali’s region because of stocks’ availability. Ali had no time to plan this huge order and there were no dispatch trucks available at that time. Should Ali take risk of organizational goals and his promotion and cancel those orders? Should Ali generate sales invoices to record sales and dispatch the stocks on next day compromising the organizational core values and policies?

BBA.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS 9: Operations and logistics.

This study aims to analyze Asian branding strategies at the regional level, and provide a map of opportunities and challenges for Asian regional branding.

The study takes, a multi‐sited interpretive approach and interview 22 brand managers throughout the Asian region. The length of interviews was approximately 1.5 hours/respondent. In‐depth case studies of two prominent pan‐Asian brands, Tiger Beer and Zuji, were also conducted. An interpretive analysis to this data set was applied and five themes were developed.

The two major challenges for regional Asian branding are negative country of origin perceptions and regional positioning being inherently fragile. Despite these key challenges, our respondents saw clear opportunities for regional branding initiatives. Brands can achieve a regional positioning by focusing on Asian modernity rather than on common cultural heritage. They can also capitalize on newfound Asian pride and confidence, and finally they can use a Western stamp of approval to signal to Asians the viability of the brand.

The paper extends previous work on the globalization of marketing activities by advancing the region as an important unit of analysis. It helps understand the development of brands in a part of the world that is becoming more important at the economic and political level. The study shows how marketers are shaping culture in the Asian context. Finally, the paper contributes a better understanding of the opportunities and challenges associated with a regional positioning and the development of regional branding strategies.

How are we to make sense of the attitudes of Social Democratic parties towards decentralisation? What do they think about what is a legitimate territorial allocation of power? What factors shapes this view? And what makes Social Democratic parties change their minds? This article addresses these questions by way of competing ideological traditions, the external strategic incentives and internal constraints. Empirically, the article presents a comparative case-study analysis of Social Democratic parties in four countries (Belgium, Italy, Spain and United Kingdom). On the basis of this analysis, I argue that the positioning of Social Democratic parties on decentralisation is influenced by strategic incentives created by the structure of political competition, whereas the policy shifts are more often produced by factors that are internal to the party. A decentralist policy shift is always associated with the capacity of regionalist parties to set the agenda by exerting pressures on Social Democratic parties. In addition, Social Democratic parties tend to shift their policy while in opposition to distinguish themselves from their centralist mainstream rival in government. The dominant mechanism found across four countries was one in which regional branches persuade the central party leadership to adopt a pro-decentralist position. This chapter illustrates how Social Democratic parties have an instinct for ‘adaptation and control’ in the face of social-structural changes, and it demonstrates that the prevalence of different ideological traditions will vary according to external strategic incentives and, crucially, by the party's internal ability to follow those incentives.

“It should also be noted that the objective of convergence and equal distribution, including across under-performing areas, can hinder efforts to generate growth. Contrariwise, the objective of competitiveness can exacerbate regional and social inequalities, by targeting efforts on zones of excellence where projects achieve greater returns (dynamic major cities, higher levels of general education, the most advanced projects, infrastructures with the heaviest traffic, and so on). If cohesion policy and the Lisbon Strategy come into conflict, it must be borne in mind that the former, for the moment, is founded on a rather more solid legal foundation than the latter” European Commission (2005, p. 9)Adaptation of Cohesion Policy to the Enlarged Europe and the Lisbon and Gothenburg Objectives.

Few would question that one of the most significant determinants of growth in the sport industry — from a sport management, marketing, and sponsorship perspective — has been the inf luence of globalization. Product expansion and communication messages have targeted the 'global consumer,' and the recognition of a 'global brand' has come to epitomize successful sport marketing. Or, has it? Although global management practices present the possibility of expanded consumer markets, a number of marketing strategists have recently begun to question the use of standardized global marketing campaigns that lack national or regional distinctiveness. At issue, is the positioning of 'regionalism' within global sport marketing strategies. This paper will investigate the role of 'regionalism' in sport marketing through; a) an examination of the regional sport marketing strategy of a leading Canadian all-sports television cable network (Rogers Sportsnet) that targets four distinct regions across Canada, and b) a survey of Canadian Generation Y youth sport participation and spectatorship trends across four regions. Implications for regional positioning within sport marketing strategies will also be discussed.

Global positioning system (GPS) kinematic positioning suffers from performance degradation in constrained environments such as urban canyons, which then restricts the application of high-precision vehicle positioning and navigation within the city. In December 2012, the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) regional service was announced, and the combined BDS/GPS kinematic positioning has been enabled in the Asia-Pacific area. Previous studies have mainly focused on the performance evaluations of combined BDS/GPS static positioning. Not much work has been performed for kinematic vehicle positioning under constrained observation conditions. This study aims to analyze the performance of BDS/GPS kinematic vehicle positioning in various conditions.

In this study, three vehicle experiments under three observation conditions, an open suburban area, a less dense non-central urban area and a dense central urban area, are investigated using both the code-based differential global navigation satellite system (DGNSS) and phase-based real-time kinematic (RTK) modes. The comparison between combined BDS/GPS and GPS-only vehicle positioning solutions is conducted in terms of positioning availability and positioning precision.

Numerical results show that the combined BDS/GPS system significantly outperforms the GPS-only system under poor observation conditions, whereas the improvement was less significant under good observation conditions.

Thus, this paper studies the performance of combined BDS/GPS kinematic relative positioning under various observation conditions.

This study is exploratory in nature and designed to address poorly documented issues in the literature. The dimensions of regional distribution or spatial organisation of Industry 4.0 (I4.0), including the potential role of clusters, have only recently been addressed, with most available studies focusing on advanced, mainly Western European countries. Although developing fast, the literature on I4.0 in other countries, such as the Central and Eastern European or post-transition economies like Poland, needs to pay more attention to the spatial distribution or geographical and organisational aspects. In response to the identified knowledge gap, this paper aims to identify the role of clusters in the transformation towards I4.0. This explains why clusters may matter for advancing the fourth digital transformation, how advanced in implementing I4.0 solutions are the residents of Polish clusters and how they perceive the advantages of cluster membership for such implementation. Finally, it seeks to formulate policy recommendations based on the evidence gathered.

The methodology used in this study combines quantitative analysis of secondary data from a cluster benchmarking survey with a case study approach. The benchmarking survey, conducted by the polish agency for enterprise development in 2021, gathered responses from 435 cluster members and 41 cluster managers, representing an estimated 57% of the current clusters in Poland. In addition to quantitative analysis, a case study approach was used, incorporating primary sources such as interview with cluster managers and surveys of cluster members, as well as secondary sources like company documents and information from cluster organisation websites. Statistical analysis involved assessing the relationship between technology implementation and the adoption of management systems, as well as exploring potential correlations between technology use and company characteristics such as revenue, export revenue share and number of employees using Pearson correlation coefficient.

In Poland, implementing I4.0 technologies by cluster companies is still modest. The cluster has influenced the use of I4.0 technologies in 23% of surveyed companies. Every second surveyed company declared a positive impact of a cluster on technological advancement. The use of I4.0 technologies is not correlated with the revenue of clustered companies. A rather bleak picture emerges from the results, revealing a need for more interest among cluster members in advancing I4.0 technologies. This may be due to a comfortable situation in which firms still enjoy alternative competitive advantages that do not force them to seek new advanced advantages brought about by I4.0. It also reflects the sober approach and awareness of associated high costs and necessary investments, which are paramount and prevent successful I4.0 implementation.

The limitations inherent in this study reflect the scarcity of the available data. This paper draws on the elementary survey administered centrally and is confined by the type of questions asked. The empirical section focuses on an important, though only one selected sector of the economy – the automotive industry. Nevertheless, the diagnosis of the Polish cluster’s role in advancing I4.0 should complement the existing literature.

The exploratory study concludes with policy recommendations and sets the stage for more detailed studies. Amidst the research’s limitations, this study pioneers a path for future comprehensive investigations, enabling a deeper understanding of Polish clusters’ maturity in I4.0 adoption. By comparing the authors’ analysis of the Polish Automotive Group (PGM) cluster with existing literature, the authors uncover a distinct disparity between the theoretical prominence of cluster catalysis and the current Polish reality. Future detailed dedicated enquiries will address these constraints and provide a more comprehensive map of Polish clusters’ I4.0 maturity.

This study identifies patterns of I4.0 implementation and diagnoses the role of clusters in the transformation towards I4.0. It investigates how advanced is the adoption of I4.0 solutions among the residents of Polish clusters and how they perceive the advantages of cluster membership for such transformation. Special attention was paid to the analysis of the automotive sector. Comparing the conclusions drawn from the analysis of the Polish PGM cluster in this case study to those from the literature on the subject, it becomes clear that the catalytic role of clusters in the implementation of I4.0 technologies by enterprises, as emphasised in the literature, is not yet fully reflected in the Polish reality.