The conventional theory of financial intermediation suggests that banks are the main conduit between savers and borrowers however, research has shown that international banks are losing importance in intermediating i.e. mobilise savings and allocating these funds among competing borrowers - this international reality is due to a number of reasons including changes in regulation, growth in capital markets, non-bank financial intermediaries, foreign competition etc. South Africa has a highly concentrated banking sector with the five largest banks holding more than 90% of the industry’s assets however growth in non-bank financial intermediaries are threatening the intermediary role and profitability of banks - this research serves to investigate whether bank disintermediation is occurring in the South African context and whether the traditional role of banks is declining.

Thesis (M.M. (Finance & Investment)--University of the Witwatersrand, Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, Wits Business School, 2016 / The banking industry plays an essential role in any economy in terms of resource mobilisation and allocation. Banks also accept deposits, create credit, offer agency, utility and money transmission services.A well-developed banking industry plays an important role in efficient financial intermediation and this helps to boost economic growth. The financial intermediary role performed by banks allows the banking sector to influence the direction of available resources, thereby affecting the rate of economic growth (Obadeyi, 2014).Due to these benefits derived from the banking sector, a large number of industrialised, developing and transition countries have undertaken extensive reforms in their banking sector over the past two decades (Swary and Topf 1992). Banking sector reforms are defined as government intervention in the banking industry to provide a panacea for existing anomalies in the banking sector (Azeez and Ojoh, 2012). The reforms that were implemented by various countries included interest rates liberalisation, the removal of quantitative controls on lending, lifting barriers to competition, deregulation of the banking sector, the privatisation of public financial institutions and the introduction of market based securities. They were implemented to enhance the intermediation role of banks, ensure that banks are well positioned to greatly mobilise savings and optimally allocate these mobilised savings in the form of credit extension to profitable investments (Ajayi, 2005). The treatise investigates the effectiveness of banking sector reforms on financial intermediation in African Countries using data of eleven countries. Annual time series and panel data which covered a period of 20 years from 1980 to 2000 was used.Secondary data which was used for this treatise was gathered fromjournals, books, peer-reviewed articles, International Monetary Fund statistics (IMF), Global Banking (Center for financial markets Milken Institute) and World Bank Financial Development database was used in this research. The regression results showed that the banking sector reforms had a negative impact on financial intermediation on the eleven countries under study. Thus, the reforms failed to achieve their objectives of mobilising savings and increasing intermediation activities (lending). In addition, the results showed that the control variables which were inflation and gross savings had an inversely relationship with financial intermediation except for income per capita which had a positive relationship. The main causes of the failure of the banking sector iii reforms in Africa were the macroeconomic imbalances, financial system instability and wrong sequencing of the reforms. / GR2018

Thesis (M.Com. (Economics))--University of the Witwatersrand, Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, School of Economic and Business Sciences, 2013. / This paper assesses the level of financial intermediation in the South African financial industry and the reasons for these levels of intermediation. Different banking intermediation measures are considered and mostly reflect disintermediation during the 1993 to 2009 period. Panel regressions are run to assess which economic factors had the biggest impact on intermediation by SA’s four largest banks (Absa Bank, Standard Bank of South Africa, Firstrand Bank and Nedbank). It is found that bank intermediation was impacted by bank size, profitability, as well as the level of competition and client relationships. The level of financial intermediation in SA has been low, negatively impacting on banks intermediation ability, and possibly impeding government and corporate sectors’ investment and economic activity.

Bangladesh is often perceived as disordered, characterised by the absence of law abiding systems of governance, and with the poor left to rely on corrupt and dysfunctional relationships. This thesis tells a different story. Examining the lives of people living in the open and most basic slums ethnographically in Dhaka city reveals that people have complex dependencies on ‘intermediaries’ or ‘brokers’ to access resources. Rather than see these relationships as dysfunctional, the core argument developed is that they are inherently part of how social order is maintained in Bangladeshi society. If order is understood as contingent on actors throughout society establishing a dominant capability for violence and accruing resources on this basis, then intermediation can be seen as a prominent means by which both of these ends are achieved. These relationships are thus intertwined with how violence is organised and controlled. A young man who grew up at a bazar described how people need to live in the shade of others, and this metaphor is used to portray this phenomenon. This thesis argues that intermediation in Dhaka has changed significantly over the past decade, with the mastan gangs once identified as powerful in radical decline, replaced by wings of the ruling political party. At the lowest levels of urban society, a complex web of intermediaries exists, including labour leaders, political leaders, their followers and informers. Some people attempt to rise in this order by mobilising as factions and demonstrating their capability for violence, but more generally people employ tactics and strategies for avoiding, negotiating and even exiting these relationships. Negotiating these relationships and one’s place in this order is conceptualised here as the politics of intermediation.

While many organizational actors, including firms, governments, universities, and non-profit organizations may have an impact on the innovative capacity of the firms with which they engage, we have little knowledge of their relative importance. The literature on innovation intermediaries reports on the impact of specific types of organizations, but has not considered the relative importance of different types of organizations. While the studies using Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data are able to consider relative effects, data on the nature of those effects are limited. In the interests of a better understanding of the relative nature and degree of the innovation enabling contributions of a range of organizational actors, I conduct a comparative examination of the contributions of firms, governments, universities, industry associations, and research institutes. Using survey data from a sample of 499 firms, I identify the actors that are most strongly associated with each of ten innovation intermediation activities.

While many organizational actors, including firms, governments, universities, and non-profit organizations may have an impact on the innovative capacity of the firms with which they engage, we have little knowledge of their relative importance. The literature on innovation intermediaries reports on the impact of specific types of organizations, but has not considered the relative importance of different types of organizations. While the studies using Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data are able to consider relative effects, data on the nature of those effects are limited. In the interests of a better understanding of the relative nature and degree of the innovation enabling contributions of a range of organizational actors, I conduct a comparative examination of the contributions of firms, governments, universities, industry associations, and research institutes. Using survey data from a sample of 499 firms, I identify the actors that are most strongly associated with each of ten innovation intermediation activities.

Governments of the G7 have relied primarily on two strategies to develop their respective economies, the commercialization of research using licensing models and new venture creation. Yet, they have acknowledged no specific approach to achieving commercialization success. In fact, the results of the methods used for the commercialization of results are generally viewed as not satisfactory, thus creating room for new approaches to be proposed. One of the strategies used to assist the commercialization process has been recently instituted through social actors called innovation intermediaries. Their involvement in the commercialization process has the potential not only to facilitate the process but also to diffuse knowledge and foster innovation. To date, their practices are still under development, motivating academics in various disciplines to originate research studies aimed at gaining a better understanding of them. The literature has proposed definitions and attributed functions to innovation intermediaries, but it has not arrived at a definitive description of these actors or their activities. In practice, innovation intermediaries do not have a standard operational structure, established methods, or metrics to report their results; they have yet to, establish their own practices or use evidence to inform their activities. The objective of this study is to clarify their practices and challenge their current modus operandi with a view to improvement. To explain the activities of innovation intermediaries (their practice), to expose the role of evidence, and to represent the main concerns of innovation intermediaries, a framework based on distinctive attributes of the practice was produced using insights gained from a systematic literature review, an exploratory study, and literature stressing the importance of evidence. The framework was tested using a confirmatory study in the form of an online survey with the participation of 55 innovation intermediaries from around the world. The results show that innovation intermediaries have a predisposition to focus their practice on strategic concerns, finding a fit for the venture offering in the market while neglecting to oversee the mechanisms required for developing a viable venture offering. They tend to support their decisions anecdotally, referencing their previous experiences without the support of systematic methods to corroborate their conclusions. Their prioritized goals are first, to persuade investors and sponsors to collaborate with their clients; second, to help their clients occupy a leading position in their markets, and third, to support their clients to refine the venture offering and transform it into a commercial success. The emergent framework has characterized the practice of innovation intermediaries, identified particular gaps in their activities and their use of evidence, and suggested that the current focus in the practice of innovation intermediaries may not be contributing all that it could to the commercialization process. This framework may be of significant value to advance this field of knowledge and hopefully contribute to professionalize the practice of these social actors. Ultimately, this research could form the foundation for strengthening evidence-based best practices for innovation intermediaries.

The process of innovation remains challenging for companies in general and for small firms in particular. Limited resources constitute an obstacle on the small firm’s path towards market launch and the need for supportive measures is evident. Today, as the technology is developing at an exponential speed, the time-to-market shortens, underlining that the innovation challenge of small firms is an urgent matter. Given the limited resources of the small firms, this thesis defines the access to external competence as well as an established new product development process as crucial factors for successful innovation. Providing these necessary functions, a public intermediary, originating from policies, is considered a viable solution. The contribution of this thesis lies in investigating whether or not a private intermediary, not supported by policies, can provide the same functions as a public intermediary. In addition, the thesis expands the knowledge about the intermediary functions present in the innovation process by relating them to specific phases in a generalized new product development process. The results in this thesis are qualitative, based on a profound literary study as well as a comparative case study, examining two diverse kinds of intermediaries in a micro perspective. The first case is a public intermediary, operating with a strong business focus, as its mission is to economically strengthen the Swedish industry. The second case presents a technology based consultancy firm, acting as a private intermediary and centered on questions related to R&D. Applying Howells’ (2006) intermediation functions to the two diverse cases, a comparative study of their offered functions has been performed. The micro perspective study has proved the acknowledged intermediation functions to be applicable to specific phases in a generalized new product development process. As several functions appear in multiple phases of the new product development process, the generalized process is observed to be iterative. This notion questions previous definitions of the intermediation functions during an innovation process, as the processes have been simplified as linear in prior research. Using the generalized new product development process as framework for a comparative analysis, it has been concluded that the private intermediary can provide the same functions as the public intermediary. In extension, the private intermediary is able to offer additional services, not legally permitted for the public intermediary, such as selecting external actors and negotiating agreements. As the private intermediary can provide an extended assortment of functions, while not being dependent on government funding, the question of whether or not the public intermediary still fills a necessary function has been raised. However, additional values, such as objectivity and a non-profit-interest have been linked to the public intermediary. As these attributes are valuable to the small firm, further studies on the support not incorporated in the investigated functions are needed.

While many organizational actors, including firms, governments, universities, and non-profit organizations may have an impact on the innovative capacity of the firms with which they engage, we have little knowledge of their relative importance. The literature on innovation intermediaries reports on the impact of specific types of organizations, but has not considered the relative importance of different types of organizations. While the studies using Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data are able to consider relative effects, data on the nature of those effects are limited. In the interests of a better understanding of the relative nature and degree of the innovation enabling contributions of a range of organizational actors, I conduct a comparative examination of the contributions of firms, governments, universities, industry associations, and research institutes. Using survey data from a sample of 499 firms, I identify the actors that are most strongly associated with each of ten innovation intermediation activities.

Governments of the G7 have relied primarily on two strategies to develop their respective economies, the commercialization of research using licensing models and new venture creation. Yet, they have acknowledged no specific approach to achieving commercialization success. In fact, the results of the methods used for the commercialization of results are generally viewed as not satisfactory, thus creating room for new approaches to be proposed. One of the strategies used to assist the commercialization process has been recently instituted through social actors called innovation intermediaries. Their involvement in the commercialization process has the potential not only to facilitate the process but also to diffuse knowledge and foster innovation. To date, their practices are still under development, motivating academics in various disciplines to originate research studies aimed at gaining a better understanding of them. The literature has proposed definitions and attributed functions to innovation intermediaries, but it has not arrived at a definitive description of these actors or their activities. In practice, innovation intermediaries do not have a standard operational structure, established methods, or metrics to report their results; they have yet to, establish their own practices or use evidence to inform their activities. The objective of this study is to clarify their practices and challenge their current modus operandi with a view to improvement. To explain the activities of innovation intermediaries (their practice), to expose the role of evidence, and to represent the main concerns of innovation intermediaries, a framework based on distinctive attributes of the practice was produced using insights gained from a systematic literature review, an exploratory study, and literature stressing the importance of evidence. The framework was tested using a confirmatory study in the form of an online survey with the participation of 55 innovation intermediaries from around the world. The results show that innovation intermediaries have a predisposition to focus their practice on strategic concerns, finding a fit for the venture offering in the market while neglecting to oversee the mechanisms required for developing a viable venture offering. They tend to support their decisions anecdotally, referencing their previous experiences without the support of systematic methods to corroborate their conclusions. Their prioritized goals are first, to persuade investors and sponsors to collaborate with their clients; second, to help their clients occupy a leading position in their markets, and third, to support their clients to refine the venture offering and transform it into a commercial success. The emergent framework has characterized the practice of innovation intermediaries, identified particular gaps in their activities and their use of evidence, and suggested that the current focus in the practice of innovation intermediaries may not be contributing all that it could to the commercialization process. This framework may be of significant value to advance this field of knowledge and hopefully contribute to professionalize the practice of these social actors. Ultimately, this research could form the foundation for strengthening evidence-based best practices for innovation intermediaries.