Lin Runhui, Fan Jianhong, Zhao Yang, Zhang Hongjuan and Hou Rujing
The purpose of this paper is to focus on the relationship between the corporate governance (CG) environment, governance behavior and governance performance and place it into the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to focus on the relationship between the corporate governance (CG) environment, governance behavior and governance performance and place it into the research of the evolution and revolution of the Chinese telecommunication industry, a complex economic system.
Design/methodology/approach
On the basis of information about the Chinese telecommunication industry from 1949 to 2009 and China Mobile from 1997 to 2007, the authors analyze the Chinese telecommunication industry from two levels, namely industry level and firm level, with the combination of a critical incident method and time series method.
Findings
The results demonstrate that the evolution of the Chinese CG environment and governance behavior presents characteristics of punctuated equilibrium; governance behavior lags behind governance environment and it can cause the governance environment to evolve to benefit its development through exerting active effects; governance environment and governance performance strongly relate to and have an effect on each other; and the improvement of governance structure and mechanisms, together with the enhancement of strategic capability, can greatly contribute to the governance performance of firms.
Originality/value
This paper has divided the development of the Chinese telecommunication industry into four stages, revealing the relationship between governance environment, governance behavior and governance performance with a case study of the Chinese telecommunication industry and China Mobile.
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Runhui Lin, Hongjuan Zhang, Jianhong Fan and Rujing Hou
This paper seeks to explore the evolution of a third generation mobile communications (3G) industry based on TD‐SCDMA technical standard in China through the lens of network…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper seeks to explore the evolution of a third generation mobile communications (3G) industry based on TD‐SCDMA technical standard in China through the lens of network analysis.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors argue that inter‐firm alliances help companies gain and integrate internal and external resources and foster technical innovation. The paper analyzes alliance governance structures and governance mechanisms in particular, and shows how they protect and improve network‐based innovation capabilities and competitive advantages during a ten‐year period with the method of social network analysis and case studies.
Findings
The authors offer a theoretical model that incorporates cooperation among organizations, the maturity of the industrial chain, and the accumulation of organizational knowledge and social capital.
Originality/value
The paper offers a theoretical model of factors that contributes greatly to the development of technical innovation.
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Jianhong Zhang, Jan P.A.M. Jacobs and Arjen van Witteloostuijn
Multinational enterprises (MNEs) play a dominant role in the international business (IB) literature. Traditionally, by far the majority of IB studies deal with issues at the micro…
Abstract
Multinational enterprises (MNEs) play a dominant role in the international business (IB) literature. Traditionally, by far the majority of IB studies deal with issues at the micro level of the individual MNE, or at the meso level of a sample of individual MNEs in industries. This paper focuses on the impact of MNE behavior through foreign direct investment (FDI) on a country’s international trade, and vice versa. In so doing, this study responds to a recent plea for more macro‐level studies in IB into the effect of MNE behavior on the macroeconomic performance of countries as a whole, particularly developing and emerging economies. In the current study, we focus on the largest developing or emerging economy of all: China. Applying sophisticated econometric techniques, we unravel the causality and direction of FDI‐trade linkages for the Chinese economy in the 1980‐2003 period.
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Jianhong Zhang, Suzana B. Rodrigues, Jiangang Jiang and Chaohong Zhou
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of political instability at the local level on foreign firms in China. Building on the literature on political embeddedness…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of political instability at the local level on foreign firms in China. Building on the literature on political embeddedness and business power, the authors propose a theoretical framework to explain how political turnover can affect foreign firms’ performance and how they respond to such challenges by leveraging their power bases.
Design/methodology/approach
To test the hypotheses, the authors apply fixed effects regression to an unbalanced panel data set comprising 13,360 foreign firms from 1998 to 2013 and the political replacement that involved changes in provincial governors.
Findings
The findings confirm that political turnover incidents have a negative impact on the performance of foreign firms in China. However, the authors also found that this negative relationship is weaker for firms that can choose various types of power sources. Specifically, the study reveals that foreign firms with large firm size, government ownership and a strong foreign direct investment community are better qualified to mitigate the negative effects of political instability.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the literature by developing the understanding of how political uncertainties and risks affect the performance of foreign firms in China and the importance of firms’ power in counterbalancing these effects. The research provides valuable insights into how multinational corporations can exploit their power to manage the effects of local political turnover, which has practical implications for the strategy and management of foreign firms operating in China.
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Jianhong Luo, Xuwei Pan, Shixiong Wang and Yujing Huang
Delivering messages and information to potentially interested users is one of the distinguishing applications of online enterprise social network (ESN). The purpose of this paper…
Abstract
Purpose
Delivering messages and information to potentially interested users is one of the distinguishing applications of online enterprise social network (ESN). The purpose of this paper is to provide insights to better understand the repost preferences of users and provide personalized information service in enterprise social media marketing.
Design/methodology/approach
It is accomplished by constructing a target audience identification framework. Repost preference latent Dirichlet allocation (RPLDA) topic model topic model is proposed to understand the mass user online repost preferences toward different contents. A topic-oriented preference metric is proposed to measure the preference degree of individual users. And the function of reposting forecasting is formulated to identify target audience.
Findings
The empirical research shows the following: a total of 20 percent of the repost users in ESN represent the key active users who are particularly interested in the latent topic of messages in ESN and fits Pareto distribution; and the target audience identification framework can successfully identify different target key users for messages with different latent topics.
Practical implications
The findings should motivate marketing managers to improve enterprise brand by identifying key target audience in ESN and marketing in a way that truthfully reflects personalized preferences.
Originality/value
This study runs counter to most current business practices, which tend to use simple popularity to seek important users. Adaptively and dynamically identifying target audience appears to have considerable potential, especially in the rapidly growing area of enterprise social media information service.
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Jianhong Luo, Xuwei Pan and Xiyong Zhu
An increasing number of users are inspired by enterprises to repost social media messages, which greatly contributes to the dissemination of such messages in an online social…
Abstract
Purpose
An increasing number of users are inspired by enterprises to repost social media messages, which greatly contributes to the dissemination of such messages in an online social network. The purpose of this paper is to discover the repost patterns of users regarding enterprise social media messages to help enterprises improve information management abilities for social media.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper proposes a novel method to discover the repost patterns of users in enterprise social networking (ESN) at the macro-level through topic analysis. Specifically, it proposes the message-diversity metric to measure the latent topic diversity degree of the social media messages. Through this technique, the paper analyzes the message-diversity characteristics of the enterprise social media messages and then explores the repost patterns of users.
Findings
The experimental results show that a high repost rate is more prominent for the messages with diverse latent topics, where message-diversity is as high as 0.5.
Practical implications
The findings have great potential in several management areas, such as employing social media marketing, predicting popular messages, helping enterprises strengthen their online presence, and gathering more potential customers.
Originality/value
This study explores how the repost patterns of users in ESN can be determined through general macro-level behavior of users instead of their micro-level processes. The patterns can also lead to a deeper understanding of which contents can drive people to diffuse information. This study gives an important insight into the information behavior of social media users for enterprise management researchers.
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Lizhi Zhou, Chuan Wang, Pei Niu, Hanming Zhang, Ning Zhang, Quanyi Xie, Jianhong Wang, Xiao Zhang and Jian Liu
Laser point clouds are a 3D reconstruction method with wide range, high accuracy and strong adaptability. Therefore, the purpose is to discover a construction point cloud…
Abstract
Purpose
Laser point clouds are a 3D reconstruction method with wide range, high accuracy and strong adaptability. Therefore, the purpose is to discover a construction point cloud extraction method that can obtain complete information about the construction of rebar, facilitating construction quality inspection and tunnel data archiving, to reduce the cost and complexity of construction management.
Design/methodology/approach
Firstly, this paper analyzes the point cloud data of the tunnel during the construction phase, extracts the main features of the rebar data and proposes an M-E-L recognition method. Secondly, based on the actual conditions of the tunnel and the specifications of Chinese tunnel engineering, a rebar model experiment is designed to obtain experimental data. Finally, the feasibility and accuracy of the M-E-L recognition method are analyzed and tested based on the experimental data from the model.
Findings
Based on tunnel morphology characteristics, data preprocessing, Euclidean clustering and PCA shape extraction methods, a M-E-L identification algorithm is proposed for identifying secondary lining rebars in highway tunnel construction stages. The algorithm achieves 100% extraction of the first-layer rebars, allowing for the three-dimensional visualization of the on-site rebar situation. Subsequently, through data processing, rebar dimensions and spacings can be obtained. For the second-layer rebars, 55% extraction is achieved, providing information on the rebar skeleton and partial rebar details at the construction site. These extracted data can be further processed to verify compliance with construction requirements.
Originality/value
This paper introduces a laser point cloud method for double-layer rebar identification in tunnels. Current methods rely heavily on manual detection, lacking objectivity. Objective approaches for automatic rebar identification include image-based and LiDAR-based methods. Image-based methods are constrained by tunnel lighting conditions, while LiDAR focuses on straight rebar skeletons. Our research proposes a 3D point cloud recognition algorithm for tunnel lining rebar. This method can extract double-layer rebars and obtain construction rebar dimensions, enhancing management efficiency.
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April Liu, Deborah Lock and Dieu Hack-Polay
Research on sojourn experiences appears to indicate that temporarily living abroad interrupts and redirects peoples’ cultural identity as they negotiate and shift their identities…
Abstract
Research on sojourn experiences appears to indicate that temporarily living abroad interrupts and redirects peoples’ cultural identity as they negotiate and shift their identities to better fit with the new environment within which they are operating (Dickens, Womack, & Dimes, 2019; Zhang & Xaio, 2021). In this chapter, a biographical reflexivity lens is used to explore events that were captured from a living abroad life: firstly, as an international student from mainland China attending university in the UK, and secondly as an international academic following a move from being a student to being a full-time member of the teaching staff at the same university. The shifting of my cultural identity to one more reflective of those found in my host country was subtle, and one which I was not conscious of until challenges by Chinese students provoked reflection about my ‘Chineseness’ since they had expected me to conform to their understanding of Chinese ways of teaching with its emphasis on rote learning and memorisation (Ai & Wang, 2017; Wang, 2018). Where ‘I’ is used in the chapter, it refers to the first author whose experience forms the basis for the chapter.