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The purpose of this paper is to provide a survey of the empirical literature on environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) estimation of carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions over the period of 1991–2017.

This survey categorizes the studies on the basis of power of income in empirical models of EKC. It has been hypothesized that the EKC shows an inverted U-shaped association between economic growth and CO₂ emissions.

For all the contexts, the results of EKC estimation for CO₂ emissions are inconclusive in nature. The reasons behind this discrepancy can be attributed to the choice of contexts, time period, explanatory variables, and methodological adaptation.

The future studies in this context should not only consider new set of variables (e.g. corruption index, social indicators, political scenario, energy research and development expenditures, foreign capital inflows, happiness, population education structure, public investment toward alternate energy exploration, etc.), but also the data set should be refined, so that the EKC estimation issues raised by Stern (2004) can be addressed.

By far, no study in the literature of ecological economics has focused on the empirical estimation of EKC for CO₂ emissions. This particular context has been used for this study, as CO₂ is one of the highest studied pollutants in the ecological economics, and especially within the EKC hypothesis framework.

To reconcile the existing contradictory conclusions on the relationship between cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&As) and innovation, this paper aims to propose a theoretical model of the impact of cross-border M&As on technological innovation and explore the moderating role of institutional distance from the perspective of springboard theory and new institutional theory.

Through the use of the two-way fixed effect model and the U-test method, the authors test the hypotheses based on a sample of cross-border M&A events of Chinese manufacturing enterprises during the period from 2006 to 2019.

The research shows that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between cross-border M&As and technological innovation. Furthermore, formal institutional distance moderates the inverted U-shaped relationship in such a way that it reaches its turning point at a smaller scale of cross-border M&As, and the inverted U-shaped relationship is steeper when formal institutional distance is relatively high. The informal institutional distance moderates the inverted U-shaped relationship in such a way that it reaches its turning point at a larger scale of cross-border M&As and the inverted U-shaped relationship is flatter when the informal institutional distance is relatively high.

The research conclusions integrate heterogeneous views of the existing research, further clarify the influence mechanism and boundary conditions between cross-border M&As and technological innovation, identify the different moderating roles of formal institutional distance and informal institutional distance and enrich the literature on knowledge transfer and recombinant innovation during post-merger integration.

Firms are increasingly depending on supplier portfolios in the quest for firm innovation. However, whether concentrated supplier portfolios are beneficial to innovation remains highly disputed. This study aims to investigate the effect of supplier portfolio concentration on firm innovation and the contingencies that shape this effect.

The authors build on the knowledge search view to theorize a U-shaped effect of supplier portfolio concentration on firm innovation and further propose that the U-shaped effect is contingent on financial slack and growth opportunities. The authors collected panel data from 1,320 manufacturing firms in China. The negative binomial regression analyses were performed to test the hypotheses.

Supplier portfolio concentration has a U-shaped effect on firm innovation. This U-shaped effect is weakened and flipped by financial slack but strengthened by growth opportunities.

The findings extend current understandings of the influence of supplier portfolio on firm innovation by clarifying the U-shaped effect of supplier portfolio concentration on innovation and the circumstances under which supplier portfolio concentration is more effective for firm innovation.

Drawing on the time compression diseconomies perspective and business network theory, this study examines how the international expansion of a business group’s pace, scope and rhythm affects its performance.

Panel data (1999–2013) from the top 100 Taiwanese business groups investing in globalization were collected.

The results show that international pace and rhythm have an inverse U-shaped relationship with business group performance, while the relationship between international scope and business group performance is U-shaped. This study highlights that international expansion is multidimensional and nonlinear and that the factors that shape nonlinear relationships between international processes and performance are different. Furthermore, family group involvement positively moderates the link between international scope and performance and negatively affects the relationship between international pace and performance. However, no significant effect is observed between rhythm and performance. High family business group involvement mitigates the impact of outsiders’ liability and managerial costs; moreover, it enhances the positive effects of location-specific advantages and business network resources.

This study combined the time compression diseconomies perspective and business network theory to explain why and how internationalization may not always lead to good performance by examining the effects of different international expansion processes and the interactive effect of family group involvement.

This study investigates firms' innovation behaviour under environmental change. Therefore, it examines the effect of trade disputes on corporate technological innovation and how product market competition moderates this relationship.

This research tests the hypotheses using the fixed effects model based on panel data of publicly listed enterprises in China from 2007–2020.

The empirical results validate the positive association between trade disputes and corporate research and development (R&D) intensity as well as the U-shaped relationship between trade disputes and radical innovation. Additionally, the moderating effect of product market competition is verified: a concentrated market with less competition flattens the U-shaped curve of radical innovation induced by trade disputes; as the market becomes more concentrated and less competitive, the U-shaped relationship eventually turns into an inverted U.

First, this study contributes to the corporate innovation and trade dispute literature by expanding the environmental antecedents of technological innovation and the firm-level consequences of trade disputes. Second, this study enriches the theoretical framework of the environment–innovation link through an integrated perspective of contingency theory and dynamic capabilities view. Third, instead of the traditional linear mindset which had led to contradictory results, this study explores a curvilinear effect in the environment–innovation relationship.

Over the past decades, mainstream studies have generally indicated that new ventures could improve entrepreneurial performance by adopting strategic alliances (SAs). However, recently an increasing number of new ventures appear to not realize this objective using SAs at all times and may, rather, even be stuck in the survival trap. This dilemma indicates that the causal relationship between SAs and entrepreneurial performance in new ventures is not simply linear and rather a further complex nonlinear relationship. To handle this debate, this study attempted to reveal the nonlinear relationship of two types of SAs (technology alliances and market alliances) in new ventures with entrepreneurial performance (organizational growth and customer value). In addition, the moderating effect of transactive memory system (TMS) in the entrepreneurial team under the nonlinear relationship was explored.

This study established a research model by considering technology alliances and market alliances as two independent variables, organizational growth and customer value as two dimensions of entrepreneurial performance, and TMS as the moderators. The survey data collected from 207 Chinese new ventures was subjected to the hierarchical linear regression method for testing the proposed hypotheses.

The results revealed that there is an inverse U-shaped relationship between technology alliances and organizational growth, while the relationship between technology alliances and customer value was U-shaped. In addition, the relationship between market alliances and organizational growth was U-shaped, while an inverse U-shaped relationship was observed between market alliances and customer value. Finally, TMS was observed to positively moderate the U-shaped relationship between technology alliances and customer value as well as the U-shaped relationship between market alliances and organizational growth.

This study concluded that a nonlinear relationship between SAs and entrepreneurial performance existed in new ventures, which contributes to resolving the debate on whether new ventures could adopt SAs to improve entrepreneurial performance at all times. Specifically, the findings of this study would enrich the existing literature on the outcomes of SAs in new ventures through an evaluation of the effect of the inverse nonlinear relationship between technology alliances and market alliances on entrepreneurial performance (e.g. organizational growth and customer value). In addition, the findings of this study would extend the discussions about the conditions of the above causal relationship by introducing the TMS as the core moderator.

This study analyzes the maturity structure of the volatility in the KOSPI200 index and futures returns. Using bivariate GARCH model, we obtain the empirical evidences that the maturity structure of the volatility is U-shaped unlike the well-known Samuelson effect. Remarkably. U-shaped structures are found not only in the futures market but also in the spot market These evidences imply that returns are more volatile around tile futures maturity date in both markets.

Some explanations are suggested about U-shaped maturity structures. First, under Samuelson hypothesis it is possible to show that the volatilities are high around the maturity date because of the volatility clustering and the volatility spill-over. Second, we try the regression of the volatility on variables such as the proportion of the individual investors, the foreign investors, and the program trading. These variables are U-shaped or inverse U-shaped due to the remaining maturity. Only before 2000, it is found that the proportions of the foreign investors and the program trading are compatible with U-shaped volatility structures.

The purpose of this study is to first investigate the efficiency of the most commonly used performance measures for minimizing the number of workstations (NWs) in approaches addressing simple assembly line balancing problem (SALBP) for both straight and U-shaped line, and second to provide a comparative evaluation of 20 constructive heuristics to find solutions to the SALBP-1.

A total of 200 problems are solved by 20 different constructive heuristics for both straight and U-shaped assembly line. Moreover, several comparisons have been made to evaluate the performance of constructive heuristics.

Minimizing the smoothness index is not necessarily equivalent to minimizing the NWs; therefore, it should not be used as the fitness function in approaches addressing the SALBP-1. Line efficiency and the idle time are indeed reliable performance measures for minimizing the NWs. The most promising heuristics for straight and U-shaped line configurations for SALBP-1 are also ranked and introduced.

Results are expected to help scholars and industrial practitioners to better design effective solution methods for having the most balanced assembly line. This study will further help with choosing the most proper heuristic with regard to the problem specifications and line configuration.

There is limited research assessing the efficiency of the common objectives for SALBP-1. This study is among the first to prove that minimizing the workload smoothness is not equivalent to minimizing the NWs in SALBP-1 studies. This work is also one of the first attempts for evaluating the constructive heuristics for both straight and U-shaped line configurations.

The purpose of this paper is to study the influence of financial flexibility (FF) on enterprise performance (EP) within Taiwan’s hospitality industry during the COVID-19 shock and explore whether EP varies with hospitality industry characteristics.

Secondary data of 39 Taiwan Stock Exchange-listed hospitality firms were collected from the Taiwan Economic Journal databases. Quantile regression analysis was applied to examine the FF-EP relationship

The results evidence that there is a U-shaped (convex) FF-EP relationship for hospitality firms in the 10th, 25th and 50th Tobin’s Q quantiles and in asset-heavy firms. For asset-light firms, FF has an inverted U-shaped (concave) effect on EP in the 90th Tobin’s Q quantile

The empirical results highlight the need for Taiwan’s hospitality industry as a whole to take rolling adjustment and optimization of FF and concentrate on liquidity risk management after the COVID-19 pandemic and for long-term sustainability.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is one of the first to examine the nonlinear FF-EP relationship in the hospitality industry of Taiwan, particularly amid the COVID-19 shock. Moreover, this study extends current literature by revealing the hospitality industry’s FF-EP relationship and highlights the importance of the pandemic crisis context.

The purpose of this study is to explore the inverted U-shaped relationship between green customer integration (GCI) and opportunistic behavior, as well as the moderating effects of contractual control and relational norms.

The authors conducted hierarchical regression analysis using two-waved data from 206 Chinese manufacturing firms to test hypotheses.

The authors found that GCI has an inverted U-shaped effect on opportunistic behavior. Furthermore, both contractual control and relational norms negatively moderate the inverted U-shaped relationship between GCI and opportunistic behavior.

This study uncovers an inverted U-shaped link between GCI and opportunistic behavior by combining transaction cost economics and social exchange theory. Furthermore, this study reveals contractual control and relational norms can be deemed as two boundary conditions affecting the inverted U-shaped GCI–opportunistic behavior relationship. This study also offers managerial implications for firms curbing opportunistic behavior that may result from GCI.