Thesis advisor: Julie H. Mortimer / This dissertation investigates firms' strategic decisions in industries characterized by a retail sector and the subsequent welfare implications. The first chapter studies retailer assortment choices; the second investigates the effectiveness of retailer online advertising. In many industries producers reach consumers only through the retail sector. Retailer product assortment choices are crucial determinants of consumer welfare as well as retailers' and producers' profitability. Limited shelf space, an inherent characteristic of the brick-and-mortar retail sector, necessitates careful selection of product offerings. The assortment decision within a product category consists of two broad questions: "How many products to offer?" and "Which products to offer?". In sole-authored work, the first chapter focuses on the latter question and investigates the drivers and welfare consequences of retail product selections. While retailer assortment choices are primarily governed by consumers' preferences and retail sector competition, vertical contracts with producers may also influence product offerings, and, in turn, product availability in the market. From the producers' perspective, obtaining product distribution is imperative. Hence, producers frequently provide financial incentives to retailers to secure their patronage. These incentives often take the form of vendor allowances: lump-sum payments to retailers that do not directly depend on sales volume. They can take the form of slotting fees, warehousing allowances, cash discounts, allowances for damaged goods, or operating support (e.g. stocking personnel). Considering the spread of the retail sector, the impact of vertical contracts on product selections may substantially affect consumer welfare and firm profitability. Therefore, it is not surprising that vendor allowances have been the subject of policy discussion. Policy makers have raised concerns that these payments are harming disproportionately small producers and limiting consumer choice. Nevertheless, the Federal Trade Commission abstains from providing clear guidelines on the use of these payments due to unclear theoretical predictions and scarce empirical evidence. The main impediment to empirical analysis has been the proprietary nature of vertical contracts and firm costs. To overcome these data limitations, I develop a novel framework that allows me to quantify vendor allowances and analyze their effects on product selections and welfare. Using only data on retail prices, quantity sold, and retailer offerings, I estimate vendor allowances as retailers' opportunity cost of shelf space. Specifically, retailers face shelf-space limitations, hence, the opportunity cost of supplying a product is the sacrificed profits from not supplying a different product in its place. With limited assumptions on producer and retailer bargaining protocol, set estimates of vendor allowances are recovered. Additionally, by assuming that producers make take-it-or-leave-it offers, point estimates can be obtained. Lower bounds from set estimates imply that, on average, vendor allowances amount to at least 5% of retailer revenues. These results suggest that vendor allowances are likely important for retailer profitability, given that public grocery chains in the U.S. report profit margins on the order of 2-4% of revenues. To investigate the effects of these payments on product selections and welfare, I apply model estimates to simulate how market outcomes change in the absence of vendor allowances. The "what-if" experiment predicts that, absent vendor allowances, retailers fare worse, product variety is reduced as retailers replace "niche" products with "mainstream" options, but consumers are nevertheless better off. Small producers, which offer high-volume products, increase market distribution and profits, but, absent marginal cost data, consequences for large producers are uncertain. The work extends our understanding of how firms' strategic interactions in the marketplace may affect consumer welfare and firm profitability through product availability. The second chapter presents a coauthored work with Alexander Bleier and Maik Eisenbeiss that analyzes the use of online advertising personalization by an online retailer. Online advertising has become an important channel through which firms attempt to influence consumer behavior and increase sales. To improve effectiveness, firms today tailor their advertisements to individual consumers with a method called retargeting. In retargeting, firms track the shopping behaviors of individual consumers' visiting their online stores and, subsequently, deliver individualized display banner ads as consumers continue browsing the Web. While this method has gained traction in the online advertising industry, research in the field is still in its infancy. This work furthers our understanding of advertising personalization by analyzing two questions: How effective is ad personalization in attracting individual consumers back to the online store? And, do different personalization approaches have distinct impacts on consumers' engagement behaviors with the online store? To answer these research questions, we exploit unique data from a randomized field experiment conducted in cooperation with a major fashion and sporting goods retailer. This study compares the effects of online banners with very high, medium, and low degrees of content personalization. For example, very high personalization refers to ads showing consumers products that they had viewed at their previous visit to the retailer's online store. Medium personalization includes products from the most viewed category or brand of their previous visit. And low personalization delivers random products from the retailer's assortment without any connection to a consumer's previous shopping behavior. Results suggest that ads with very high personalization are more effective in bringing consumers back to the online store than the other campaigns. However, we also find that the gain in visits of very high- over medium-personalization banners stems mainly from visit with low consumer engagement. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2016. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Economics.

As part of the Accelerated Shared Growth Initiative of South Africa (AsgiSA), the South African government is focusing on improving the country's export performance (Department of Trade and Industry, 2006a). One of the objectives of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) is to increase the level of South African exports through the development and implementation of strategies for targeted markets. The DTI commissioned a study to scientifically identify priority products and markets in order to justify its export promotion activities and to ensure that government resources are effectively allocated. Tills led to the development of the Decision Support Model (DSM) by Viviers and Pearson (2007) as an instrument to identify realistic export opportunities for South Africa. The Viviers and Pearson (2007) study adapted and refined the methodology of Cuyvers et al. (1995) to the South African circumstances and used a sequential filtering process to identify realistic product/market export combinations for South Africa. The outcome of the DSM for South Africa was 9690 SITC product/market opportunities in seventy-four countries, clustered in twelve geographic regions. One of these regions was the Middle East. The DTI indicated the need for a study on South Africa's export opportunities to the Middle East as a result of their prioritisation of regions for export promotion. This need is therefore the rationale of this study. The research objectives were to analyse the identified Middle East countries and determine the product with the most realistic export opportunities to two of the Middle East countries and lastly, to develop a market profile to assist the DTI in promoting the exports of this product to these countries. In this study, several methods of product and market selection were investigated in order to determine the most suitable method to identify the product/market opportunities from the DSM to the Middle East. The product selection method selected involved a three-phase filtering process to determine the product with the highest export potential to the Middle East. The analysis was based on a cluster-selection process. It was determined that fruit juice was the product with the highest export potential to the region. The market selection process used a composite market potential index to determine which country in the Middle East had the highest potential for exports of fruit juice from South Africa. The two countries in the Middle East with the highest potential to import fruit juice from South Africa were Oman and Qatar. A market profile for the export of fruit juice to Oman and Qatar was developed. The market profile provided an economic overview of the two markets, analysed the market potential of fruit juice and provided technical information regarding the requirements for the export of fruit juice by South Africa to Oman and Qatar. The results of this study firstly indicate to the DTI and exporters that South Africa should export fruit juice to Oman and Qatar and secondly presents a market profile with detailed information of the process to follow in exporting fruit juice to these countries. / Thesis (M.Com. (International Commerce))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2010.

As part of the Accelerated Shared Growth Initiative of South Africa (AsgiSA), the South African government is focusing on improving the country's export performance (Department of Trade and Industry, 2006a). One of the objectives of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) is to increase the level of South African exports through the development and implementation of strategies for targeted markets. The DTI commissioned a study to scientifically identify priority products and markets in order to justify its export promotion activities and to ensure that government resources are effectively allocated. Tills led to the development of the Decision Support Model (DSM) by Viviers and Pearson (2007) as an instrument to identify realistic export opportunities for South Africa. The Viviers and Pearson (2007) study adapted and refined the methodology of Cuyvers et al. (1995) to the South African circumstances and used a sequential filtering process to identify realistic product/market export combinations for South Africa. The outcome of the DSM for South Africa was 9690 SITC product/market opportunities in seventy-four countries, clustered in twelve geographic regions. One of these regions was the Middle East. The DTI indicated the need for a study on South Africa's export opportunities to the Middle East as a result of their prioritisation of regions for export promotion. This need is therefore the rationale of this study. The research objectives were to analyse the identified Middle East countries and determine the product with the most realistic export opportunities to two of the Middle East countries and lastly, to develop a market profile to assist the DTI in promoting the exports of this product to these countries. In this study, several methods of product and market selection were investigated in order to determine the most suitable method to identify the product/market opportunities from the DSM to the Middle East. The product selection method selected involved a three-phase filtering process to determine the product with the highest export potential to the Middle East. The analysis was based on a cluster-selection process. It was determined that fruit juice was the product with the highest export potential to the region. The market selection process used a composite market potential index to determine which country in the Middle East had the highest potential for exports of fruit juice from South Africa. The two countries in the Middle East with the highest potential to import fruit juice from South Africa were Oman and Qatar. A market profile for the export of fruit juice to Oman and Qatar was developed. The market profile provided an economic overview of the two markets, analysed the market potential of fruit juice and provided technical information regarding the requirements for the export of fruit juice by South Africa to Oman and Qatar. The results of this study firstly indicate to the DTI and exporters that South Africa should export fruit juice to Oman and Qatar and secondly presents a market profile with detailed information of the process to follow in exporting fruit juice to these countries. / Thesis (M.Com. (International Commerce))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2010.

In this dissertation I focus on two considerations that influence the product strategy of a firm. The first is consumers’ choice and its influence on a firm’s product offering, and the second is the interaction between durable products and their contingent consumables. First, I study the assortment planning problem for a firm; I illustrate the complexity of solving this product selection problem, present simple solutions for some commonly used choice models, and develop heuristics for other practically motivated models. Second, I study the incentives of a durable goods monopolist when she can lock-in consumers through a contingent consumable. Adopting a lock-in strategy has two interesting effects on the incentives of a durable goods manufacturer. On one hand, by locking-in consumers to its consumable, a durable goods monopolist can curb its temptation to reduce durable prices over time, thereby mitigating the classic time inconsistency problem. On the other hand, lock-in will create a hold-up issue and adversely affect consumers’ expectations of future prices for the consumable. My research demonstrates the trade-off between time inconsistency and hold-up, and derives insights about the conditions under which a lock-in strategy can be effective. I further analyze the trade-off between time inconsistency and hold-up associated with lock-in in the presence of consumable stock-piling. My findings indicate in the presence of consumer stock-piling, lock-in has an effect similar to that of competition in the consumables market: they help to dampen the hold-up problem that arises from lock-in and at the same time increase the manufacturer’s incentive to reduce durable prices over time. / text

Syfte: Det föreligger svårigheter att undvika byggprodukter som innehåller farliga ämnen då användningen av dessa varor i vissa projekt är oundviklig spelar dokumentering en nyckelroll. Detta då spårbarhet förutsätter ett gott dokumenteringsunderlag. Genom att vidare kontrollera produkter som byggs in säkerställs det att nödvändig information finns tillgänglig för beslutsfattning och problemlösning. Detta för att möjliggöra hantering av eventuella lagstiftningsförändringar under ombyggnationer eller vid ändring av kemiska ämnens klassificering. Produktval har som ord blivit en vanligare förekomst i byggbranschen efter att Produktvalsprincipen presenterades i Miljöbalkens 2 kapitel 6 §. Produktvalsprincipen uppmanar till att produktval i så stor utsträckning som möjligt ska undvika produkter med fara för människa och miljö om de kan ersättas med mindre farliga. Syftet med arbetet är att kartlägga hur en förvaltarbyggherre inom den offentliga sektorn arbetar med produktval och undersöka vilka problem som kan uppstå kopplat till arbetet samt undersöka hur BIM kan effektivisera processen. Metod: För att upprätta arbetets teoretiska ramverk har en litteraturstudie genomförts. I arbetets fallstudie har empirin som insamlats bestått av dokumentanalys samt intervjuer med projektaktörer. Resultat: Arbetet har kartlagt förvaltarbyggherrens produktvalsprocess samt vidare hur denne ställer krav kopplat till det utförda arbetet, entreprenören genomför sedermera produktval utifrån krav samt rekommendationer i miljöprogram, administrativa föreskrifter samt rambeskrivningar och dokumenterar dessa i projektets loggbok. Problem studien funnit är att produkter ej i full utsträckning registreras utifrån satta krav. Författarna har vidare lokaliserat att i takt med att BIM-utvecklingen fortskrider kommer detta med tid möjliggöra för beställare att tillsammans med färdigställt projekt erhålla en specifik BIM-modell berikad med aktuell produktinformation (en Asset- Information-Model). Då projekterad information och inköpsinformation lagras i en BIM-modell kan en effektivare informationshantering säkerställas med hjälp av leveransspecifikationer vid överföringen av information mellan system. BIM- teknologin möjliggör vidare en effektivare uppföljning av ställda krav samt på sikt en effektivisering av processen som den genomförs idag. Konsekvenser: Rapporten ligger till grund för att tydliggöra upprättning av krav och problem relaterat till produktval under projektering och byggskede. För att produktvalsprocessen ska förlöpa på ett kvalitetsmässigt sätt bör satta krav efterföljas samt ansvariga för registrering genomgå utbildning. Rapporten föreslår att beställare genom ekonomiska incitament kopplar inköpsutbetalningar mot färdig produktdokumentering. En BIM-modell kan när mognadsgrad uppnås med fördel användas som dokumenteringsunderlag. Begränsningar: Rapportens resultat begränsas då undersökningen utförs från tidig design till och med första efterbesiktning samt att endast ett projekt har granskats. / Purpose: There are difficulties in avoiding construction products containing hazardous substances considering that the use of these products are inevitable in some projects. Documentation regarding product selection plays a key role as traceability requires thorough documentation. By adding further control of built-in-products it is ensured that necessary information is available for decision making and problem solving. This will allow the managing of possible legislative changes, during reconstruction or when chemical substances get their classification status changed. Product selection has become a more common occurrence in the construction industry since the release of Miljöbalkens second chapter 6 §, The Product selection principle (Produktvalsprincipen). This legislation has called for product selection to avoid hazardous products where they can be replaced with products less dangerous. The propose with this bachelor thesis is to map how a property developer/facility manager in the public sector transacts the work regarding product selection, map the problems related to the procedure and find a solution to the problem with the help of Building Information Modelling (BIM). Method: To create the theoretical framework of the report a literature study has been conducted. The empirical collection has been made in the form of a case study with empirical collection through interviews and document analysis. Findings: The thesis has mapped how the property developer/facility manager conducts product selection and how the property developer/facility manager sets the requirements connected to product selection. The entrepreneur documents the selected products with an outlook in set requirements in a log book. Problems the study has found are that all utilized products are not documented. The authors have further found that as BIM technology progresses it will eventually enable clients to procure specific BIM models enriched with specific product information. When information is stored in the BIM model it is possible to ensure more efficient information management with the help of information delivery specifications when transferring information in between systems. BIM technology also enables a more efficient follow up of requirements and in the long term a less labour intensive product selection process. Implications: The thesis bases the clarification of requirements and problems that the product selection consists of during the construction planning and construction stage. For the product selection to proceed with quality in mind, set requirements should be followed and the ones responsible for documenting products should undergo adequate training. The thesis proposes clients to connect economic incentives to purchase payments when product documentation is complete. A BIM-model can when maturity level is achieved compile of- and be utilized as product documentation. Limitations: The thesis result is limited in the sense that the investigations that has been conducted has examined the construction phase from early design to final inspection and has studied one project alone.

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Legacy systems are usually expensive to maintain, and they quickly become outdated in a fast changing industry with new requirements and technologies. However, replacing an old system with a complete new one could prove both costly and time consuming, and therefore the method of reengineering could present itself as a beneficial alternative. There is a lack of practice-based research in relation to the implementation of software reengineering. The main purpose of this thesis is therefore to recognize key aspects on how to reengineer web-based IT systems in a modern, easy-to-maintain and business-enhancing manner. A case study has been carried out, a reengineering of a legacy system used for product selection at Grindex AB, a Swedish submersible pump supplier and manufacturer. The process includes three stages, firstly a thorough analysis of the legacy system has been carried out, secondly interviews were conducted in order to identify new requirements, and lastly a new system was developed by Struts 2, Spring MVC, Spring, Hibernate in Java and a relationship database of MySQL. The author is presenting six areas of consideration – architecture, function, interface, language, data storage and algorithm – in relation to the software reengineering life cycle, and with a comparison between the legacy system and the reengineered system. / Legacy system är ofta kostsamma att underhålla och de blir fort förlegade i en industri i snabb förändring med nya krav och teknologier. Men det kan samtidigt visa sig kostsamt och tidskrävande att byta ut ett gammalt system mot ett helt nytt. Mot denna bakgrund skulle metoden reegineering kunna utgöra ett fördelaktigt alternativ. Den praktiskt orienterade forskning i relation till programvaruutveckling genom reegineering är knapphändig. Det främsta målet med denna avhandling är därför att ringa in viktiga aspekter sett till hur webbaserade ITsystem skulle kunna reegineras på ett modernt sätt, enkla att underhålla och företagsfrämjande. En studie har genomförts, en reegineering av ett legacysystem som använts för produktval på Gridex AB, en svensk leverantör och tillverkare av dränkbara pumpar. Processen omfattar tre delar. Först genomfördes en grundlig analys av legacy systemet, sedan genomfördes intervjuer för att identifiera nya krav och avslutningsvis utvecklades ett nytt system med Struts 2, Spring MVC, Spring, Hibernate i Java och en relationsdatabas i MySQL. Författaren presenterar sex områden att beakta – arkitektur, funktion, gränssnitt, språk, datalagring and algoritm – i relation till programvarureenginderingens livscykel och med en jämförelse mellan legacysystemet och det reegingerade systemet.

This business plan is written for a to-be-founded trade company which focuses on the trade between Taiwan and Switzerland. The environmental analysis (Chapter 4) shows that there are countless opportunities for trade between the two countries. The goal of the company is to find products and solutions with considerable potential. Therefore, this business plan does not focus on just one product; instead a process defines how the company selects and develops the products in its portfolio (Chapter 3). By making these products available in the other country, the company gives Taiwanese and Swiss manufacturers new business opportunities and gives the potential customers better and different solutions to their problems. The company’s goal is to build long-term partnerships with its suppliers in order to ensure a high level of quality (Chapter 5). The company will set up two logistic centers, one in Taiwan and one in Switzerland, which will be the hubs for standardized and efficient distribution processes (Chapter 7). In order to keep the costs low during the first years, marketing and sales (Chapters 8 and 9) will focus most of its activities on B2C products which are mainly sold through ecommerce activities. Finally, the financial forecasts (Chapter 10) show that there is a very high level of uncertainties for the financial success of the company. Therefore the cost structure of the company must be highly flexible to be adjustable to the company’s growth.

As the green movement begins to sweep through the construction industry, decision-makers are beginning to include a sustainable aspect to their purchase decisions. Selecting a product solely based on its sustainability, however, is not enough to drive product selection in the construction industry. Cost still dominates the selection of building products. The level of sustainability of a product and its cost are not interconnected as market prices do not reflect the cost of environmental impacts, such as the cost of global warming or fossil fuel depletion. Having two distinct aspects to consider adds complexity in the product selection process. Typically, it constrains decision-makers to perform a trade-off analysis that does not necessarily guarantee the most environmentally preferable purchase decision. This study proposes a life-cycle management (LCM) system that reinforces the choices made by decision-makers by providing a scientific justification for those decisions. The proposed system analyses the environmental and economic performance of building product through life-cycle analysis and purchase price analysis. It operates on tools publicly available in the market and state-of-the-art analysis, assessment, and interpretation methods. The LCM system combines two distinct product attributes into a single performance score that can be easily interpreted. It allows decision-makers to compare product scores and ultimately make the most environmentally responsible and financially viable selection. A comprehensive approach is used to refine and test the LCM system using case studies comprised of an environmental and economic performance evaluation of flooring products. The contribution of this research includes the consideration of a holistic approach to product selection based on environmental and cost performance. Pre-construction estimators and construction managers could improve their estimating and product selection practices using the proposed system. Material suppliers can also benefit from this approach, as they can use it to enhance their pricing strategies, marketing plans, and overall product competitiveness.