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Recent branding failures (e.g. Kodak and Krispy Kreme) have cast considerable doubt on the widely accepted contention that to develop a strong brand, firms must continuously strive to be brand oriented or innovation oriented. This study aims to examine the curvilinear and interactive effects of brand orientation and innovation orientation on brand performance.

Survey data were drawn from a sample of 181 firms operating in the consumer goods sector (i.e. fashion, consumer electronics and automobile) and tested through a hierarchical regression analysis.

This study finds that the sole and exclusive focus on either brand orientation or innovation orientation is detrimental to the realisation of superior brand performance because increased levels of this focus lead to diminishing returns. Critically, this study finds that the key to achieving superior brand performance lies in the extent to which the firm integrates both brand orientation and innovation orientation.

This study extends current knowledge by showing that focusing on either brand orientation or innovation orientation in isolation is actually detrimental to the firm’s realisation of superior brand performance. The integration of brand orientation and innovation orientation is the key to achieving superior brand performance because the inherent limitations associated with each are overcome by their integration.

While extant research highlights the importance of both market orientation and brand orientation in brand success, it is still unclear how they actually combine to contribute to brand performance. Grounded in the theoretical perspectives of the resource-based view and dynamic capabilities, this study unpacks how, and when, brand orientation and market orientation link systematically to influence brand performance.

In testing the research hypotheses involving mediation and moderation effects, survey data were gathered from a sample of business firms in the manufacturing sector and analyzed through regression analysis.

The results suggest brand orientation manifests through market orientation to influence brand performance via the intervening mechanism of brand management capability. The results also suggest at high levels of competitive intensity, the systematic combination of market orientation and brand orientation is critical in facilitating brand management capability enhancement and subsequent brand performance.

This study extends current literature by providing a more detailed account of how brand orientation and market orientation systematically combine to yield superior brand performance via the mediating role of brand management capability. This study also provides further insights into how, in response to different levels of competitive intensity, the systematic combination of brand orientation and market orientation is managed to facilitate brand management capability enhancement and subsequent brand performance.

The literature establishes complex relationships between entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and performance, with mixed findings suggesting the variability of the magnitude of the relationship between the two. Some studies report a positive relationship, some negative, while some report an insignificant relationship between EO and performance. These conflicting findings suggest that the EO-performance relationship is more complex than a simple main-effects-only relationship. The literature offers two distinct approaches – integrating moderating or mediation variables in advancing the EO-performance relationship. The purpose of this paper is to extend current knowledge by examining underlying processes through which EO contributes to performance and the specific conditions under which this process is facilitated.

To test the hypotheses the authors chose small service firms in Australia. Industry representation included: accommodation and food services; health care services; rental, hiring and real estate services; transport, postal and warehousing; arts and recreation services; retail trade; construction and training services; and professional, scientific and technical services. The services sector offers a unique opportunity to analyze variances in entrepreneurial engagement and organizational outcomes given the competitive intensity within the service sector which requires firms to engage in venturing, renewal and innovation. The proposed hypotheses were tested through a hierarchical regression analysis.

This study finds the support for the mediation effect of marketing capability on the EO-performance relationship. Critically, this study also finds that marketing resources moderates on the indirect effect of EO on performance via marketing capability. The findings supporting both the mediation and moderation effects of marketing capability and marketing resources on the EO-performance relationship (moderated mediation model) suggests that greater insight into how EO influences small service firm performance can be achieved through considering in combination with other firm-level constructs (marketing capability and marketing resources in this study).

It addresses the call by prior studies to link the EO construct to theory by embedding marketing resources and marketing capabilities in the EO-performance relationship. Importantly, by accounting for both mediation and moderation effects the authors provide a more complete picture of the EO-performance relationship that highlights the mediating role of marketing capability and the moderating role of marketing resources. This approach helps to reconcile the critical but separate directions proposed by prior studies in advancing the EO-performance relationship.

A strong brand is one that consumers know and perceive as differentiated from competing brands. Building brands with high levels of awareness and uniqueness is critical to ensuring brand strength and sustained competitiveness. To this end, the roles of brand management capability and brand orientation are highlighted. However, given the significance of consistency in branding, firms’ brand management capability and brand orientation alone may not be sufficient, and a mechanism that facilitates branding consistency is required. In the integrating marketing control theory with the resource-based view (RBV) and dynamic capabilities (DC) theory, this study aims to examine how a firm’s brand orientation, when supported by formalisation, contributes to building brands with high levels of awareness and uniqueness through the intervening role of brand management capability.

In testing the hypotheses proposed in this study, survey data were drawn from a sample of firms operating in the consumer goods sector and examined through hierarchical regression analysis.

This study finds that firms are more likely to build brands with high levels of awareness and uniqueness in the market when their brand orientation is supported by formalisation, because this combination (brand orientation and formalisation) facilitates branding consistency and brand management capability development.

In weaving together the theoretical perspectives of marketing control, RBV and DC, this study extends current knowledge by showing that brand management capability and brand orientation alone are insufficient for building brands with high levels of awareness and uniqueness. Instead, maximising their performance effects requires the support of formalisation.

The purpose of this paper is to determine if high versus low ethnocentric consumers differ in their attitudes toward buying domestic and foreign brands of underwear that are made domestically or in foreign countries.

Australian residents recruited through a mall intercept participated in this study through a self‐completed questionnaire. Fishbein's Multi‐Attribute model was used as the measure, along with repeated‐measures ANOVA and t‐tests, to examine whether the groups differed in their attitudes toward buying underwear with “Made in Australia”, “Made in the USA”, and “Made in China” labels.

The findings generally indicated that there is no significant difference between high and low ethnocentric consumers in attitude towards underwear that are made in Australia and the USA. On the other hand, high ethnocentric consumers viewed domestically made and branded underwear as more durable, easier to care for, better priced, more colourful, more attractive, more fashionable, of stronger brand name, more appropriate for occasions, and more choices of styles. Domestically‐made but foreign‐branded underwear is viewed as easier to care for and better priced.

The study suggests that China should improve its country image as compared to such developed nations as Australia and the USA in terms of production and manufacturing standards. The study also purports that American underwear brands with strong presence in the global fashion world that have not already established operation in Australia can consider entering the market.

The paper fills the gap in the ethnocentrism literature by validating the study in Australia and focusing on the attitudes of high ethnocentric (and low ethnocentric) consumers. It also examines underwear, which is a common product category in apparels but inherently deficient in the literature.

Religion is a significant force in the lives of many people, however; its role in fashion clothing consumption is still unclear. To expand the knowledge on this issue, the present study seeks to understand the role of religiosity in affecting status consumption and fashion consciousness (FC) among Generation Y Muslim consumers, specifically focussing on Iran.

A survey was designed and administered in Iran to a sample of 300 young adults aged between 18 and 24.

The findings of research show an inverse association between status consumption and religiosity, where individual's FC is contingent upon the degree to which they are status conscious or religious. The other major finding of the present study is the importance of brand status in mediating the relationship between FC and willingness to pay (WTP) a price premium for fashion clothing brands.

The originality of the study rests on exploring the moderating role of religiosity on the relationship between status consumption and fashion conscious among Iranian Generation Y Muslim consumers. Further, contrary to the belief that fashion conscious customers are willing to pay extra to obtain fashion brands, this relationship is not direct. New fashion conscious consumers pay extra provided that the new fashion brand enhances their status. Thus, the importance of status is in acknowledging the relationship between FC and WTP a price premium.

With its worldwide fame for making action films, Hong Kong cinema has been defined as masculine. Action films, including the costumed martial arts films and the modern gangster films, have been a major genre in Hong Kong cinema from the 1960s on. Despite the dominant masculinity, women still play significant roles in some of these films. In fact, fighting women leave footprints in the history of Hong Kong cinema, which precede their counterparts in the West and even provide models for Hollywood after 2000.

This chapter focuses on the female characters portrayed by the acclaimed Hong Kong director Wong Kar-wai, whose works have an ambiguous connection to mainstream genres. He modifies Hong Kong action films and creates unconventional female characters such as the drug dealer in Chungking Express (1994), the killer dispatcher in Fallen Angels (1995), the swordswoman in Ashes of Time (1994), and the kung fu master in The Grandmaster (2013). Wong's films have been mush discussed in academia, but the gender images therein are quite ignored. With high intertextuality, these characters are used to question mainstream action films and redefine women's roles in male's cinematic space. In addition, via the writing of these women, Wong constructs an open and ambivalent post-colonial Hong Kong identity. This paper contextualises the figures of sword-wielding and gun-shooting women and examines how Wong Kar-wai deploys these images to articulate the cultural identity of a post-colonial city.

This chapter examines how the breakthrough of Zhang Ziyi's depiction of a female kung fu master in The Grandmaster (2013) transforms the figure of the heroine in Chinese action films. Zhang is well known for her acting in action films conducted by renowned directors, such as Ang Lee, Zhang Yimou and Wong Kar-wai. After winning 12 different Best Actress awards for her portrayal of Gong Ruomei in The Grandmaster, Zhang announced that she would no longer perform in any action films to show her highest respect for the superlative character Gong. Tracing Zhang's transformational portrait of a heroine in The Grandmaster alongside her other action roles, this analysis demonstrates how her performance projects the directors' distinctive gender viewpoints. I argue that Zhang's characterisation of Gong remodels heroine-hood in Chinese action films. Inheriting the typical plot of a daughter's use of martial arts for revenge for her father's death, Gong breaks from conventional Chinese action films that highlight romantic love during a woman's adventure and the decisive final battle scene. Beyond the propensity for sensory stimulation, Gong's characterisation enables Zhang to determine that women can really act in action films – demonstrating their inner power and ability to create multi-layered characters – not merely relying upon physical action. This chapter offers a relational perspective of how women transform the action film genre not merely as gender spectacles but as embodied figures that represent emerging female subjectivity.

This study employs advanced modelling to assess the effectiveness of Malaysia’s current energy policies in achieving a low-carbon future. By optimising a 100% renewable energy mix, including energy storage, the research identifies pathways to decarbonise the power sector while minimising costs. These findings will inform the development of future policies.

This study employs the Stockholm Environment Institute-developed Low Emissions Analysis Platform (LEAP) and Next Energy Modeling system for Optimization (NEMO) to construct and optimise a comprehensive Malaysian power sector model. The model encompasses both electricity supply, including diverse electricity generation sources and demand across key sectors. Three scenarios – existing policy, optimised existing policy and more ambitious policy (near-zero emissions) – are analysed.

Solar photovoltaic (PV) is the dominant technology, but realising its full potential requires significant grid upgrades. While natural gas expansion underpins Malaysia’s decarbonisation strategy, solar and storage offer a cleaner and potentially cost-effective alternative. Rapid technological advancements in clean energy increase stranded asset risk for new gas power plants. Malaysia’s abundant bioenergy resources need more tapping. This can contribute to decarbonisation and rural development. Transitioning to a fully renewable grid necessitates substantial investments in energy storage and grid infrastructure. While falling battery costs and regional interconnection can mitigate costs, careful consideration of potential disruptions and cost fluctuations is essential for resilience.

Energy sector modelling results are inherently dependent on input assumptions, such as future technology costs, resource availability and fossil fuel prices. These factors can be highly uncertain. While this study did not conduct sensitivity analyses to explore how variations in these assumptions might affect the results (e.g. cost variations across scenarios, technology mix fluctuations), the core findings provide valuable insights into potential decarbonisation pathways for Malaysia’s power sector. Future studies could build upon this work by incorporating sensitivity analyses to provide a more comprehensive understanding of how key results might change under a wider range of future possibilities.

This study co-optimises a 100% renewable energy mix for Malaysia, incorporating a comprehensive range of renewable resources, battery and pumped hydro storage. The research also provides a unique perspective on the interplay of philosophical underpinnings, psychological maturity and energy policy.