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The review examines the existing literature on blockchain-based small and medium enterprise (SME) finance and highlights its trend, themes, opportunities and challenges. Based on these factors, the authors create a framework for the existing literature on blockchain-based SME financing and lay down future research paths.

The review follows a systematic approach. It includes 53 articles encompassing multiple dimensions of blockchain-based SME finance, including peer-to-peer lending platforms, supply chain finance (SCF), decentralized lending protocols and tokenization of assets. The review critically evaluates these approaches' theoretical underpinnings, empirical evidence and practical implementations.

The review demonstrates that blockchain-based SME finance holds significant promise in addressing the credit gap by leveraging blockchain technology's decentralized and transparent nature. Benefits identified include reduced information asymmetry, improved access to financing, enhanced credit assessment processes and increased financial inclusion. However, the literature acknowledges several challenges and limitations, such as regulatory uncertainties, scalability issues, operational complexities and potential security risks.

The article contributes to the growing knowledge of blockchain-based SME finance by synthesizing and evaluating the existing literature. It also provides a framework for the existing literature in the area and future research paths. The study offers insights for researchers, policymakers and practitioners seeking to understand the potential of blockchain technology in filling the SME credit gap and fostering economic development through improved access to finance for SMEs.

This study identifies the factors responsible for obtaining price premium on privately placed equity in a developing market.

We examine a unique data set of a special case of private placement of equity, Qualified Institutional Placement (QIP) in India purchased at a premium. The study analyzed 188 equity issues offered between September 2006 and December 2014. On average, we find that QIP issues received a price premium of 4.38%. The study employed binary probit and ordinary least square regression models to analyze the probability and magnitude of the premium.

The study attributes the price premium of QIP to certification effect through group affiliation, signaling through promoters' ownership and monitoring effect through existing institutional investors. These factors influence the probability of premium for QIP issues. However, group affiliation and institutional ownership do not significantly influence the magnitude of the premium.

The private placement of equity is usually offered at a discount. Our findings contribute to the existing literature by evaluating the premium obtained on private placement as a unique scenario in emerging market supported through certification hypothesis, monitoring hypothesis and signaling.

Women's entrepreneurship and empowerment play a vital role in enhancing their decision-making abilities, access to information, resource control and economic strength. This study explores the relationship between entrepreneurship and women's empowerment, focusing on West Bengal, India. Primary data were collected from three districts of West Bengal, specifically Paschim Medinipur, Bankura, and Purulia, targeting women as the sample population. Women's empowerment was assessed based on five dimensions, including 20 indicators. Further, a multidimensional women's disempowerment index (MWDI) was also formulated, considering the Alkire Foster methodology to capture its multidimensional aspect. The results show that the majority of the entrepreneurial activities undertaken by the women microentrepreneurs were environmentally friendly. Among the considered indicators of women's empowerment, the percentage share of women who had the freedom to visit markets, health facilities, and banks was the highest, whereas the percentage share of women who had the ability to protest was the least. Further, the percentage share of empowered women was significantly higher among the microentrepreneurs as compared to those who were non-entrepreneurs. As regards the determinants of women's empowerment, education, employment, asset ownership, and entrepreneurship play a crucial role in increasing women's empowerment. However, 30% of the women entrepreneurs faced challenges in running their businesses, whereas financial constraints along with marketing and selling issues, competition from rivals, and regulatory issues turned out to be the major hurdles. To conclude, entrepreneurship plays a crucial role in empowering women by encouraging them to establish micro-enterprises and by helping foster green growth, leading to sustainable development.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically study the impact of product patent regime on the productivity of different categories such as ownership, R&D, size and product-wise of Indian pharmaceutical firms using non-parametric data envelopment analysis.

The present study has applied Ray and Desli’s Malmquist productivity index and its decomposition to measure total factor productivity (TFP) change, pure technical efficiency change, scale efficiency change and technical change under variable returns to scale (VRS) technology assumption for 141 Indian pharmaceutical firms during 2000-2001 to 2014-2015.

The study found the negligible impact of product patent regime on productivity. The technological change has played a positive role in the growth of productivity, whereas technical efficiency change depicts the judicious utilization of resources for improving performance. From the results, it is found that R&D intensive firms depict better stability in the TFP than the non-R&D firms. However, Granger causality between R&D and productivity found no relationship. Productivity is more directly affected by investment in fixed assets rather than in R&D, which focusses on incremental value additions in a largely branded/plain generic product market. In case of ownership, private foreign firms found to have registered progress in TFP while others have recorded marginal regress, which probably could be attributed to the superior marketing and management skills of the foreign firms, besides possessing proprietary technology. Both small and large firms have shown positive growth in the new regime as compared to the pre-patent regime. These small firms are able to compete with large firms because of their up-gradation of the technological base by improving access to better foreign technology. TFP growth for all the firms can be attributed to improvement in technology, and innovation in terms of high capital-output ratio. Further, the paper tried to identify the determinants of productivity from panel random effect regression, and it is found that export intensity, age and the new patent regime have negative and significant relationship with productivity, whereas other variables such as R&D, ownership, size and capital imports are insignificant. In the end, the results of sensitivity analysis have confirmed the validity of the selected variables.

The results suggest that Indian pharmaceutical firms need substantive improvement in TFP by improving managerial and scale efficiency. Indian pharmaceutical industry (IPI) needs to improve productivity across the network and drive cost excellence initiatives across the spend base through operational excellence and digital initiatives. The results of this paper can be applied in framing policies for future growth and improvement in the productivity of IPI.

The paper aims to make several new contributions to the existing literature. Most of the research papers only analysed TFP of the industry as a whole and detailed firm-wise analysis is needed to capture the true impact at a unit level. This study has analysed the impact of different categories such as ownership, R&D, size and product-wise, and determinants of productivity. The study has used a broader time period and larger panel data to predict the better picture.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate commitment escalation tendencies and magnitude in groups of entrepreneurship-minded decision makers.

The paper uses a software-based management simulation to expose 447 graduate business students in the USA and India to research stimuli under conditions that resemble important aspects of entrepreneurs’ business environment, such as a focus on overall firm performance. Unlike most previous escalation research that studied individuals, the primary unit of analysis is a three-person group.

The paper demonstrates a positive relationship between the groups’ entrepreneurial intentions and escalation magnitude. The paper also finds a direct relationship between sunk costs and subsequent investment amounts, suggesting an additional route through which sunk costs may impact escalation behavior – anchoring and insufficient adjustment.

The authors hope that the findings will stimulate further research on commitment escalation modalities and mechanisms among entrepreneurship-minded decision makers and provide impetus for efforts to develop effective debiasing strategies.

The study addresses a long-standing gap in entrepreneurship research, by demonstrating a significant positive relationship between entrepreneurial intentions and escalation behaviors. Also noteworthy, the results are generated using a different research method (simulation) than the experimental approach used in most extant escalation research. As such, the exploration provides important triangulating evidence that is currently lacking from the rich escalation literature.

The concentration of women entrepreneurs on influential events such as the development of green entrepreneurship, which lead to the coordination and dynamic balance between economic and environmental goals, can create a bright future for businesses with sustainable and environmentally friendly architecture. The main purpose of this study is to provide a framework for the successful entry of women entrepreneurs into green entrepreneurship.

The present qualitative applied descriptive-analytical study was conducted on a population of women entrepreneurs working in green businesses. This population was obtained by the non-probability chain sampling method and an exploratory interview with the saturation of 12 individuals. Thematic analysis was used to analyze the findings.

The results revealed that creating shared value, inclusive social acceptance, multifaceted interactions and green dynamic bedding are effective in the entry of women entrepreneurs into green entrepreneurship in the form of “competitive empowerment” and “multiplied green synergy”. Thus, managers and planners should consider some factors, including shared value, social acceptance, inclusive acceptance, building green culture, knowledge flows, multiple participation, networking dimension, green marketing, competitiveness, creating platforms, green technologies and risk management.

This research tries to present a framework for the entry of women entrepreneurs into green entrepreneurship area.

The authors seek an answer to the research question: how do the disclosure of the intended use of initial public offering (IPO) proceeds and firm characteristics jointly influence IPO performance?

Data on the use of proceeds, firm age, size, high- or low-tech industry, and the length of the use of proceeds section were collected from 341 IPOs in the USA, UK, and Hong Kong. Fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis was used to predict which configurations of IPO use of proceeds and firm characteristics consistently led to above-average IPO performance.

Ten configurations of causal factors were found to lead to above-average IPO performance. Disclosure of IPO proceeds use matters for IPO performance but is contingent on firm characteristics. Whether a firm is in a high- or low-technology industry along with its size and age have distinct effects on which intended uses of proceeds are beneficial and how long their intended proceeds section must be to lead to above-average IPO performance.

These findings contribute to a multidimensional view of IPO performance. The authors use information processing and a management perspective to see how the use of proceeds sections help frame an IPO’s equity story. The use of a configurational methodology and a management perspective shows how IPOs can be viewed as a bundle of attributes.

The purpose of this study is to comprehend the efficiency levels of the Indian textile industry and also its sub-sectors in the light of changing global and national business environment. It is imperative to study the efficiency levels of textile industry for an emerging economy like India, where the industry contributes up to 13 per cent in export earnings, 10 per cent in total industrial production and 2 per cent in gross domestic product (GDP). The study holds an important place in the wake of phasing out of the quota regime existing under the Multi Fibre Agreement (MFA) and the rising competition being faced from countries such as Bangladesh, Vietnam and Cambodia.

The present study attempts to have an in-depth analysis of the efficiency levels in the Indian textile industry using meta-frontier data envelopment analysis, which is a non-parametric linear programming based frontier technique.

The findings highlight that the Indian textile industry is inefficient and has a huge scope of improvement in terms of efficiency. It also confirms the existence of different production functions among the sub-sectors of the industry. Among the different sub-sectors, the proximity of production frontier of readymade garments is the closest to meta-frontier followed by cotton and blended yarn, man-made fibre, cloth and others.

The findings bear strong implications for the policymakers in their attempt to regain the lost competitive position of the Indian textile industry and to enhance its contribution in the economy. As per the findings, policymakers should target the relatively inefficient sub-sectors of textile industry (cloth, man-made fibre, cotton and blended yarn) to infuse more efficiency in these sectors to enhance the market share of the Indian textile industry in the global textiles market.

The current study is a unique addition to the sparse literature on managing efficiencies in the textile industry, particularly of emerging economy like India. Looking at the methodological and geographical coverage of the previous work, it was found that no study has explored and analysed the efficiencies of the sub-sectors in the Indian textile industry using meta-frontier analysis. Therefore, this study will be the first of its kind which seeks to fill such gaps and intends to enrich the available literature.

The study aims to measure the subscription level and examine the determinants of oversubscription of small and medium enterprise (SME) initial public offerings (IPOs) in India.

The study employs cross sectional data to analyze 403 SME IPOs issued from Feb 2012 to May 2018 and listed on Bombay Stock Exchange's small and medium enterprise (BSE SME) platform and National Stock Exchange (NSE) EMERGE to investigate the determinants of oversubscription of SME IPOs. Hence, the study makes use of ordinary least square regression and quantile regression to test the hypotheses formulated for the determinants of oversubscription.

The main findings unveil that while issue price, pricing mechanism, listing delay negatively influence oversubscription; firm size, underwriter reputation, hot market and underpricing have been divulged to positively influence oversubscription. However, issue size emerged out to be significant in quantile regression at 25th, 50th and 75th quantiles.

The present study is confined to limited number of variables in understanding the factors impacting oversubscription. Future studies could include macroeconomic variables like gross domestic product (GDP), inflation rate, industry specific variable, i.e. technology/nontechnology industry, financial/nonfinancial industry for better understanding. Cross country analysis is suggested in future studies to validate the findings of current study. Future studies are advised to conduct the study examining the factors affecting oversubscription in light of COVID-19 pandemic.

The findings of the present study offer implications to academicians, investors, investment advisors and regulators. It provides useful insights to researchers by listing the factors that contribute to variation in subscription levels in emerging economy like India thereby, paving the way for future researches in SME IPOs in countries with different institutional settings. For investors, the study provides additional and novel information useful for IPO valuation and informed investment decisions. In addition, the findings put investment advisors in better place to guide potential investors regarding investment in good quality SME stocks (i.e. highly subscribed stocks) in more informative manner. Last but not the least, as this study would assist the regulators in handling future IPOs in a way that augments the chances of success of SME IPOs.

This study is a novel contribution in widening the IPO literature by examining the relationship between pre-IPO firm actions like issue price, pricing mechanism, issue size, firm size, listing delay, underwriter reputation, hot market, underpricing and oversubscription in unexplored settings of Indian SME IPOs.