Search results

Despite the disadvantages of limited research resources and little influence over the global electronic market, Taiwan is able to build from scratch an IC manufacturing industry that is now the fourth in the world in terms of total revenue. The manufacturing performance of Taiwan’s IC industry significantly resides in low cost and quick delivery. This raises an important question: why Taiwan is able to achieve such manufacturing excellence in the IC industry. Proactive practices adopted by Taiwan’s IC manufacturing industry are considered as a competitive weapon. The purpose of this study is to identify the proactive practices in relation to manufacturing performance based on a multiple case study. Furthermore, government policy, vertical disintegration, industrial clusters, foreign provider supports and technology manpower are the industrial factors that enhance the manufacturing advantage. Finally, the industry weaknesses and future challenges of the IC manufacturing industry are presented.

Wellness tourism is growing in importance as increasing numbers of travelers place a priority on their health and well-being by traveling. This study examined the relationships between wellness tourism destination attributes, perceived quality, perceived mental health, eudaimonic well-being, overall satisfaction and behavioral loyalty to corroborate a model explaining wellness tourism destination loyalty in Thailand.

The conceptual model of this study was examined using a survey research design. The survey questionnaire was distributed to Chinese tourists who had previously traveled to Thailand and engaged in wellness tourism activities during their trip.

The findings revealed that healthful food choices, core facilities and staff service significantly influenced perceived quality. This perceived quality was a crucial factor in determining perceived mental health, which in turn impacted eudaimonic well-being. Overall satisfaction was directly influenced by perceived quality, perceived mental health and eudaimonic well-being. Additionally, perceived quality had a direct effect on behavioral loyalty.

With the growing global interest in wellness and travel, this study offers valuable insights for tourism marketers in Thailand to enhance their wellness tourism strategies. Tourism organizations should emphasize the quality of food, facilities and staff service to attract wellness-oriented travelers.

This study highlights the interconnectedness of perceived quality, good mental health and eudaimonic well-being. High-quality experiences contribute to improved mental health and in turn enhance eudaimonic well-being.

Fuzzy theory provides a rigorous, flexible approach to the problem of defining and computing. Therefore, to facilitate decision making in a geographic information system (GIS), the graph layer indicator and the Takagi‐Sugeno (T‐S) fuzzy model must be integrated. This study aims to explain several versions of the T‐S fuzzy model based on fuzzy theory and fuzzy operation.

An inference model is constructed for GIS using the T‐S fuzzy model to formulate an integrated T‐S decision‐making (TSDMK) system.

The TSDMK system accommodates inexact, linguistic, vague and uncertain GIS data. The operator assigns most graph layer indicators by intuition.

Simulation results for the Hualien main station show that the proposed TSDMK system is an effective approach for GIS decision making.

This investigation assesses applications of fuzzy logic for decision making in a GIS based on TSDMK graphs focusing on model‐based systems.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between structural damage and sensitivity indices using the Hilbert‐Huang transform (HHT) method.

The relationship between structural damage and the sensitivity indices is obtained by using the HHT method. Three sensitivity indices are proposed: the ratio of rotation (RR), the ratio of shifting value (SV) and the ratio of bandwidth (RB). The nonlinear single degree of freedom and multiple degree of freedom models with various predominant frequencies are constructed using the SAP2000 program. Adjusted PGA El Centro and Chi‐Chi (TCU068) earthquake data are used as the excitations. Next, the sensitivity indices obtained using the HHT and the fast Fourier transform (FFT) methods are evaluated separately based on the acceleration responses of the roof structures to earthquakes.

Simulation results indicate that, when RR < 1, the structural response is in the elastic region, and neither the RB nor SV in the HHT and FFT spectra change. When the structural response is nonlinear, i.e. RR1, a positive trend of change occurs in RB and RR, while in the HHT spectra, SV increases with an increasing RR. Moreover, the FFT spectra reveal that SV changes only when the RR is sufficiently large. No steady relationship between the RB and the RR can be found.

The paper demonstrates the effectiveness of the HHT method.

This paper aims to study the factors that influence customer loyalty toward the internet service providers in Malaysia. The five factors used are corporate image, perceived quality, perceived value, price fairness and promotion. The mediating variable of this study is customer satisfaction, while customer loyalty is the study variable.

The primary data collection has been done by distributing survey questionnaires to 338 internet users in Malaysia. The data collected have been analyzed with SAS software.

The results showed that perceived quality has the strongest influence on customer satisfaction toward internet service providers in Malaysia. However, corporate image has no relationship with customer satisfaction toward internet service providers in Malaysia. Furthermore, customer satisfaction has a significant and positive relationship to customer loyalty toward the internet service providers in Malaysia.

European Customer Satisfaction Index has been adopted and combined with price fairness and promotion as a new research model that other researchers may look into it further. This research may also serve as a guide to internet service providers as they may learn about the underlying factors that affect the satisfaction and loyalty of customers and which factor has the strongest impact.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the direct and indirect relationship between board gender diversity and corporate tax avoidance using corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a mediating variable.

This study uses a panel dataset of 200 French firms listed during 2007–2018 period. The direct and indirect effects between board gender diversity (BGD) and tax avoidance were tested by using structural equation model analysis.

The results indicate that the presence of women on corporate boardrooms negatively affects tax avoidance. The greater the proportion of women in boards, the lower the likelihood of tax avoidance practice. In the mediation test, CSR appears to partially mediate the link between women on boards and corporate tax avoidance. Additional analysis shows that the social dimension of CSR produces this mediating effect.

The results have practical implications for companies in regulating the composition of their boards. To benefit from diversity, firms have to increase women‘s percentage in their boards of directors. Also, investors are encouraged to pay attention to the percentage of female directors when investing and purchasing shares.

This study proved empirically that the higher proportion of female directors significantly reduces the possibility of tax avoidance either directly or indirectly through enhancing CSR performance. The findings show that firms with gender diversified boards are more likely to get involved in CSR for hedging against the potential consequences of aggressive tax avoidance practices. In light of the above results, firms are well-advised to strongly apply the policy encouraging or mandating women as board members to take advantage of their expected benefits.

The originality of this paper consists in proposing the establishment of both direct and indirect relationships between BGD and corporate tax avoidance through CSR. Unlike prior studies that have been examining the direct relationship between corporate governance mechanisms and corporate tax avoidance, this study went further to investigate the indirect relationship between these two constructs. This study also differs from prior studies as it examines the effect of BGD on each of constituting pillars of CSR, namely, environmental, social and governance. To date, an extensive part of CSR research has used the combined score of CSR, but the effects on different CSR pillars remain little investigated.

This paper provides a quantitative review of the literature on the repercussions of idiosyncratic information on firms’ cost of equity (CoE) capital. In total, I review the results of 113 unique studies examining the CoE effects of information Quantity, Precision and Asymmetry. My results suggest that the association between firm-specific information and CoE is subject to moderate effects. First, the link between Quantity and CoE is moderated by disclosure types and country-level factors in that firms in comparatively weakly regulated countries tend to enjoy up to four times greater CoE benefits from more expansive disclosure—depending on the type of disclosure—than firms in strongly regulated markets. Second, a negative relationship between Precision and CoE is only significant in studies using non-accrual quality proxies for Precision and risk factor-based (RFB)/valuation model-based (VMB) proxies for CoE. Third, almost all VMB studies confirm the positive association between Asymmetry and CoE, but there is notable variation in the conclusions reached when ex post CoE measurers are used.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is considered one of the crucial branding and promotional tools for banks to legitimise their role in society to become socially and environmentally responsible corporate citizen. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of CSR on stock price volatility of the US banks. This study further examined the moderating role of tax on the relationship between CSR and stock price volatility.

This study uses the random-effects panel regression estimation technique to test the hypotheses. The authors include a sample of 37 US banks from 2013 to 2017 with 144 bank-years observation. The authors consider the environmental, social and governance (ESG) scores from Refinitiv as a proxy for CSR. The financial data are also collected from the Refinitiv Datastream database.

This study finds a significant and positive relationship between CSR and stock price volatility, which indicates that shareholders of the US banks may not prefer excess concentration on CSR because of the additional cost of investment associated with implementing CSR. Also, tax payments and stock price volatility show a significant positive association, which implies that there is a higher possibility of an increase in stock price volatility if the tax rate increases. Generally, shareholders are not interested in paying more taxes, so they may swap the market instead of paying more tax. On the other hand, the authors find a non-significant moderating effect of tax payment on CSR-volatility nexus.

Previous studies mainly focussed on CSR and financial performance of banks. Conversely, studies focussing on CSR and stock volatility are limited. This study will fill the gap in the literature by considering the effect of CSR on the stock price volatility of the US banks.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of human resource development (HRD) practices on perceived operational and market performances in the software companies in India, and also the mediating effect of operational performance in the relationship between HRD practices and market performance.

Data were collected from 516 professionals working in 37 software companies in India. Partial least square (PLS) was used to test the proposed structural equation model.

The findings reveal that the HRD practices significantly affect market performance. However, operational performance, as a mediator, was found to have a crucial role in transferring the effects of HRD practices to market performance.

The findings of this study are in line with the theory of HRD which suggests a positive relationship between HRD and organizational performance.

The results suggest that to enhance the market performance, organizations need to enhance operational performance by meticulously designing and implementing the series of HRD practices.

This study is one of its kind to overcome the limitations of earlier studies to examine the effect of comprehensive dimensions of HRD on operational and market performance.