I studied nest characteristics, breeding dispersal, and nest defence behaviour of Northern Flickers (<i>Colaptes auratus</i>, hereafter flickers) in central interior British Columbia with respect to nest predation. My research focused on three questions: (1) Are there nest characteristics associated with the risk of nest predation and nest loss to European Starlings (<i>Sturnus vulgaris</i>)? (2) Does nest predation influence breeding dispersal? (3) Do parental attributes influence nest defence behaviour? <p> An examination of flicker nest-site characteristics at five spatial scales revealed that nests were safer from mammalian predators (N=81) when they were higher, concealed by vegetation, farther from continuous coniferous forest blocks, and contained fewer conifers within the nesting clump. Proximity to conifers increased predation risk, but nests safe from competitors (N=18) were closer to coniferous forest blocks and contained a higher percentage of conifers in the nesting clump. Flickers face a trade-off between being safe from predators and safe from competitors. <p> Nesting success did not influence between-year breeding dispersal by 159 male or 76 female flickers. Because nests and forest clumps were not predictably safe from predators, benefits of dispersing likely outweigh costs. Other factors such as mate-switching, nest ectoparasites, and a fluctuating food source may play larger roles in dispersal than nest predation. Within years, 73% of pairs switched nest sites after their first attempt failed due to predation (N=37); however, there was no reproductive advantage for these pairs compared to pairs that remained at their original nest. Stressful encounters with predators involving nest defence may trigger dispersal, although it seems to offer no greater nest success. Of 24 flicker pairs presented with a control model before egg-laying, 3 pairs abandoned their nest, whereas 4 out of 24 pairs presented with a squirrel model abandoned their nest. This suggests that a one-time encounter with a nest predator is not a sufficient deterrent against continued nesting. Rather, costs of finding and excavating or renovating a new cavity may cause individuals to tolerate some risk in nesting at a location with an active predator. <p> In experimental trials (N=94), intensity of nest defence behaviour against a model predator was not related to the sex, age, body size, and body condition of the defending adult(s). The sexes may have behaved similarly because they are similar in size and have similar survival patterns. Costs and benefits of nest defence for flickers of different ages may also be equal because flickers are relatively short-lived and their survival rate is not linked with age. Brood size of the defending adult was also unrelated to the intensity of nest defence. If flickers have adjusted their clutch size in relation to the number of young for which they can optimally provide care, then no effects of brood size on nest defence behaviour should be recorded, as was the case here.</p>

The organic food market in Sweden has grown continuously in the last decades. This led many retailers and small stores to start selling organic food as well as extending their organic food assortment and variety extensively. In this thesis our purpose was to analyse the Swedish organic food market in terms of competition and business level strategy. The two main players in the market (ICA and Coop) were chosen to be analysed in more detail as well as a local store (Bikupan). The results of the local store were generalized for other small and local stores in Sweden. This was done to get a better picture of the market and about how the companies in the Swedish organic food market compete with each other. Our data was collected by doing three semi-structured interviews, two with Coop and one with Bikupan. Furthermore, we sent out one questionnaire to ICA. In the case of Coop, we interviewed the manager for sustainable development and one specific Coop store due its interesting concept “Green Room” where almost only organic food is sold. The answers were then linked with our general findings about the market as well as our theoretical framework and the following findings were made: ICA and Coop are the main competitors followed by Axfood there are not many differences between ICA and Coop competition is to some extent based on price increasing pressure on small, local stores due to the main players’ ever increasing market coverage ICA is closest to be the cost-leader, whereas Coop is somewhat more focusing on differentiation. Small, local stores are truly differentiated compared to Coop and ICA.

The company A in this article is a Household Service company. The industry in Taiwan presents a perfect competition. It¡¦s very difficult to compete in this situation. The Household Service of Taiwan is an emerging industry in the past decade and there were only few studies on it. In this study, I will try to discuss Household Services of Taiwan through the marketing and competition strategies. This study is using case study, the results are listed below: 1.The Household service industry in Taiwan mostly concentrated in three major metropolitan areas, especially in Taipei. 2.The ¡§Training¡¨ is the core competence of all the Taiwan¡¦s Household Service companies. 3.The overall company¡¦s marketing capabilities in Taiwan Household Service Companies, as opposed to the Japan¡¦s Household Service Companies is relatively insufficient. 4.The suggestion to the company is the need to take more cooperation with other industrial sectors, and the development of the new products (services).

The aim of the paper is to investigate what impacts that offline stores will have on their existing competition as retailer firms introduce online stores to compete with rivals.Since online markets become much mature and prevalent recently,retailer firms catch up on the trends and operate online stores in succession.On account of online stores' convenience and vast potential customers,the introduction of online stores must have a great influence on those offline stores that already in the market.Therefore,we analyze the threat that offline stores may confront with lots of perspectives after online stores¡¦ introduction.In addition,under the circumstances that the government imposes sales tax on online stores and offline stores,we compare their after-tax profits with their pre-tax profits while online stores are vulnerable to evade taxation.

This article aims at exploring how the monopolist determines the optimal allocation of advertising and pricing when he faces the threat of the potential firm entering the market. When consumers are unable to distinguish the quality of a commodity, they will use the weighted average willingness to pay of the high quality and the low quality goods to be the willingness to pay for the commodity. Because that the average willingness to pay is different among consumers of different types, thus the monopolist¡¦s decisions concerning the allocation of advertising budget and pricing will be influenced. We found that no matter what the average willingness to pay is, as long as the monopolist has the ability to compete against price, the expenditure on advertising will be larger; otherwise, the expenditure on advertising will be smaller.

Abstract With the trend of globalization and the pricing competition caused by China¡¦s manufacturing business, the quality of products is not the only issue that companies are facing now. There are some external as well as internal challenges that companies must face. External challenges include the competitive trend caused by the dynamic environmental movements and the operation pressure caused by facing competitors; internal operation issues concern the integration of the value chain and the continuous improvements in innovative managing skills. The case of research is the largest company professionally specialized in manufacturing drain cleaners in Taiwan. The company¡¦s sales are entirely dedicated to exporting to the international market; and OEM and ODM are its main type of business. Since drain cleaners are categorized as part of the hand tools industry, we must study the trends and activities in such industry. The business opportunities in the hand tools industry mainly depend on consumer¡¦s demand, providing different services to different individual buyers, and the opportunities derived from the rise of the home improvement market. Therefore, in the hand tools market, drain cleaner manufacturers should take into consideration that products which suit the new generation¡¦s need better and are with high economic values are more likely to satisfy the consumer needs. For the main thesis of this paper, we will be looking at discussions about the innovative and competitive strategies from literatures related, and the research will be based on J. Barney¡¦s resource base theory. Through the individual case analysis and roots study in grounded theory, I hope to achieve the following research purposes in this paper: 1. To analyze the operating state and the competitive advantages in the drain cleaner market in hand tools industry in Taiwan. 2. How the company in case study responds to the external challenges and which competitive advantages and strategies the company should take when facing such challenges. The conclusions to the company competitiveness in the case study based on relevant researches are as follows: 1. Regarding the case company¡¦s competitiveness against foreign markets, cost competitiveness is not recommended as the main business strategy, but rather to develop and strengthen the high-price, high quality markets as the recommended strategy. 2. Facing the competitions that the rise of the Asian market and the emergence of the Chinese consumer market brought, I suggest that the company in the case study, with its regional economic advantage, should consider a strategic alliance with European or American buyers or strategically to consider a joint venture with them. 3. Regarding providing useful information about the competitive market for the company, cost accounting standard procedures and other statistics related forms are strongly recommended to be established within the company in the case study, in order to provide critical information for managing department. 4. With the coming of the era of internationalization, the company in the case study should design an international personnel training system as well as a strategic human resource department to face the related incoming issues that internationalization may bring. Keyword¡Gstrategy, core competence, dynamic competition, internationalization

Lubricants is the most broadly used item in petrochemical products. It is used in all kinds of transportation vehicles like cars, trains, and aircraft, also factory operations like hydraulic system, rotary device and metalworking process. The lubricant consumption is directly related to local industrial status. Furthermore, the growth rate of national lubricants usage amount is directly related to domestic GDP growth rate. Relative to other Asia Pacific countries, the lubricant market has always been very competitive in Taiwan. According to investigation, there are more than 200 lubricant brands in Taiwan market, including the top two local brands, CPC and FPCC; and international brands like Shell, Mobil, BP, Castrol, NOP and Idemitsu. Besides these well-known brands, a great number of domestic small and medium lubricant companies supply the rest of the market by its own branding or OEM. The research collects and analyzes global lubricant market as well as that of China and Taiwan, interviewing Taiwan lubricant experts and people in the business to discuss current local lubricant industry and future outlook for market competition analysis. The study case is based on the leading brand of Taiwan lubricant market; the company already takes more than 30% of Taiwan market share and still hunger for better achievement. According to case study company's SWOT, industrial environment, future develop direction and trend, this research summarizes and indicates strategical guidance of lubricant market for the company.

Common sunflower is a competitive annual native dicot found in disturbed areas, on roadsides, dry prairies, and in row crops. Common sunflower is a competitive weed, but little data exist on interference, economic impacts, and competition in field corn. Field studies were conducted in 2006 and 2007 to 1) define the density-dependent effects of common sunflower competition with corn; 2) define the necessary weed-free periods of common sunflower in corn; 3) evaluate common sunflower control with herbicides; 4) and define the economic impact of common sunflower interference with corn. Corn grain yield was significantly reduced when common sunflower densities reached 1 plant/m of row and potentitially damaging common sunflower densities occurred if allowed to compete for more than 2 to 4 wk after planting for maximum corn yield. No significant corn yield reduction occurred if common sunflowers emerged 8 wk after planting. Growing degree day (GDD) heat units for corn showed that the critical point for control of common sunflower was approximately 300 GDD. Atrazine applied PRE, atrazine followed by (fb) glyphosate or halosulfuron POST, glyphosate POST, halosulfuron POST, and halosulfuron plus nicosulfuron POST controlled >87% of common sunflower. Atrazine applied PRE in a 30-cm band, nicosulfuron POST, and atrazine broadcast plus S-metolachlor PRE showed significantly lower common sunflower control and corn grain yield, when compared to atrazine PRE fb glyphosate POST. Economic impact of one sunflower/6 m of crop row caused a yield loss of 293 kg/ha. Various corn planting densities showed that corn yield can be reduced 1990 kg/ha with common sunflower competition. Corn planting densities of 49400 and 59300 plants/ha provided the greatest net returns with or without the presence of common sunflower competition. The highest net returns occurred with no common sunflower competition in 2006 and 2007, at $3,046/ha and $2,687/ha, respectively, when net corn prices were $0.24/kg ($6.00/bu). Potential control costs of various herbicide treatments revealed net returns of $1,156 to $1,910/ha in 2006 and $1,158 to $1,943/ha in 2007. Determining the economic impact of common sunflower interference in field corn allows producers to estimate the overall net return based upon density and duration of common sunflower interference, while considering varying net corn prices, crop planting density, and herbicide application costs.

After Taiwan and China joined WTO and the world industry globalization trend, the competition is intense that enterprise management and worldwide allocation between Pure-Play and IDM wafer foundry. And in Mainland China, they promoted and developed IT industrial very active, specially in wafer foundry industry. By Michael E. Porter¡¦s Diamond Theory, 1. Production ; 2. Demand ; 3. Relevant and Support industry ; 4. Strategy, Structure and Competitor of Enterprises. Meanwhile, it is important of government policy, culture and leadership glamour. If we can well manage these influence factors, the country will be increased their national competition advantage. So, these are government's important duty. In this thesis, there is one synthetical comparison with five factors, such as Technical Capability, Manufacturing Managemet, Financial Advantage, Cost Controlling and Marketing. We try to study the Strategy of Positioning, Cluster Effect and Competition Advantage for wafer foundry industry of Taiwan. In Taiwan, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC) and United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC), they are world-leading semiconductor foundry companies. There is one competitor --- IBM with technology and price and another potential competitor --- SMIC with low price and capacity of mass-production

Abstract In 2004 the market shares of Taiwan taken the place of Japan and became the 2nd in the world, only next to Korea.In the near future, we can forecast that TFT-LCD will succeed the semi-conductor industry to stand for the star industry of Taiwan. Since the supplychain of TFT-LCD are very long, complicate and most of the key components controlled by big supplier from Japan and USA. In market,From 2004 Q3, the new 6th and 7th TFT-LCD generation production line in Korea, Japan and Taiwan will start to trial run. At the same time, the LCD-TV market expands slowly by the high price. With all these unclear condition raise the worry about the future of this industry. It is difficult to forecast the feature condition. Taiwan¡¦s company face more competitive and uncertain condition. The conclusions of this study are presented as follows: This study simulates possible condition by poters Industrial scenario in the feature. According these possible condition this study also provide a process of develop competitive strategy for Taiwanese corporations. This research offer suggestions for Taiwanese corporations: 1) proceed to vertical integration in key components and mergers to achieve competitive scale. 2) cooperate or form alliance with Japanese corporations 3) make use of Co-opetition strategy to change the element of competition between Taiwan¡BJapan¡Bchina and Korea. 4) Taiwan companys should create competitive advantages by using the vertical allied with supplier and the strongest advantage of cluster effectiveness. 5) shift manufacturing to China to achieve cost advantage.6) It is good time develping own¡¦s brand. Then Taiwanese corporations will establish competitive advantages in this industry.