ABSTRACTTitle: The Effect of Customer Preferences Dynamism on Incumbent Firms:The Case of Nokia in the Mobile Phone industry.Authors: Adnan Kandeel kandeeladnan@gmail.comDinsel Sali dinsel08@yahoo.comFaculty: Department of Management and EngineeringDate: 27th of May 2013Background: The study of the dynamism of customer preferences’ effect onincumbent firms offers in-depth understanding of the active roleof customers in affecting the position of incumbent firmswhich has been neglected in the vast majority of literaturethat examined the declining position of incumbent firms.Aim: The aim of this thesis is to examine the dynamism of customerpreferences’ effect on incumbent firms.Definitions: Incumbent firm: the dominant firm in an industry.Customer preferences: the collection of attributes including explicitand implicit attributes of a certain product.Preference stereotypes: the implicit prejudgement by customers about a certain product that can not be ascribed to an explicit attribute.Methodology: A qualitative approach where online historical data from 1100 NokiaMobile phone user reviews for 11 years were collected, profiled, andthen analyzed.Completion and results: Incumbent firms are affected by the dynamism of explicit andimplicit preferences through their effect on radical and incrementalinnovation. Furthermore, preference stereotypes can affect incumbentfirms’ ability to impact the change of product meanings throughradical innovation and investment in technology.Keywords: Incumbent firms, Customer preferences dynamism, Radical innovation

Despite the volume of literature examining the role of producer amenities (e.g., highways and airports) in firms’ selection of a location, almost no quantitative studies regard the impact of consumer amenities (e.g., theatres and cafes) in attracting firms, as they are hypothesized to attract residents rather than firms or companies. Since the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector is regarded as a significant driver and an increasingly important part of the economy in North American and European countries, this research aims to provide insight into the importance of consumer amenities in the location pattern of companies in this sector. Consumer amenities are stated to be important factors in the lifestyle of creative and talented workers such as employees of high-tech industries (Florida, 2003); therefore, this study hypothesizes that ICT firms tend to locate near consumer amenities as they are assumed to be attractive to the talented and highly educated workers that those firms want to employ. ICT firms, because of their size and use, can also be integrated into existing land use, such as downtown where there are lots of amenities. Industrial uses would be more likely to locate near highways because of their land requirements. This thesis looks at a broad pattern as an exploratory study to see if there is a location pattern between consumer amenities and ICT firms’ location. Using census data from Canadian industries, this thesis focuses on exploring a spatial pattern for distribution of ICT companies, both with regards to amenities and the location of firms in other industries. In doing so, information of 66,078 firms that operate in Vancouver and their associated data were obtained from Statistics Canada and the Canadian Business Database. A walkability index is also developed that represents the amenity variable. The findings of this study suggest that ICT firms are more likely to be found in areas with a high concentration of consumer amenities. However, the result shows that there is statistically weak relationship between location of ICT firms and existence of consumer amenities, but this relationship is generally not detected for firms in other sectors. Moreover, the most significant finding of this thesis is that there is a tendency for ICT firms to locate close to and concentrated in downtown cores. As a result, the findings demonstrate that the agglomeration factor in ICT firms’ location decision is more important than the existence of consumer amenities in the place. This study concludes by suggesting that municipalities and their local economic development specialists wanting to attract regional economic growth to better understand and focus on the determinant elements of location decision by ICT firms.

Audit Quality is the most important factor to a public accounting firm. The financial crisis of lots of companies shows that the audit quality of public accounting firms has problems. The audit decision-making process in the Big 5 and other middle size accounting firms has been structured, but there are short of discussing to understand the behavior of auditor in public accounting firms. The existing literature suggests that fairness can provide a reasonable explanation for employees¡¦ satisfaction and job performance, but the answer of what can improve the perception of justice is not clear. The emphasis on this research is the effect of justice perception by leadership style and communication in the accounting firm. According to the questionnaire and regression analysis this research found when the degree of leadership style is high, the degree of the perception of justice will be higher. And the communication situation has positive effect on the perception of justice. Not all of the interaction effects on the perception of justice are positive and signature. The result of this research suggests that the leader in the public accounting firms can change their behavior and the information quality and quantity to improve the justice perception of employee.

Retailing industry is facing sterner competition in satisfying consumers¡¦ needs due to diversified market demands and shorter product life cycles. Thus, the selling characteristics of retailers have changed significantly into multifunctional retailing. Under the trend of internationalization, multinational retailers gradually entered Taiwan and became the major retailing channel in Taiwan. This thesis aims at analyzing the characteristics of multinational retailers¡¦ managerial control systems, comparing their attributes under different conditions of: level of internationalization, capital structure and styles of managers, and determine whether different retailing chain would yield different managerial control systems. Research objectives are as follows: 1. To analyze the relation between the design, operation and staff styles in managerial control systems of retail stores located in different locations. 2. The relation between the level of internationalization and the level of structuralization of the retail stores¡¦ managerial control systems. 3. Serve retailing industry in Taiwan as an example, whether there are relations between stockholder structures and firms¡¦ managerial control systems. 4. To provide a basic model of improvement on managerial control systems in Taiwan¡¦s retailing firms under different cultural structures. This thesis applied both in-depth interview and questionnaire survey methods to gather practical experiences of the interviewees. Four aspects are used to analyze whether the internal managerial systems of retailers are different. Related studies are also consulted. The research discovered that although retailing is categorized into service industries, the consumers generally possess high price elasticity, thus methods are needed to lower costs. As a consequence, extreme centralization and bureaucratic control systems are necessary to a firm¡¦s success, especially to multinational retailers¡¦ managerial control systems.

Thesis (doctoral)--Uppsala universitet, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references.

This study investigates the growth and non-growth of small-and-medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) over the long-term. A multiple case study methodology was used to examine the growth paths of eight SMEs over a period of fourteen years. Four firms represented manufacturing and four, the professional and business services industry. The firms were paired according to similar sectors and contrasting growth paths. Longitudinal employment data illustrated the firms’ growth paths, and the primary method of data collection was semi-structured interviews of the firms’ owner-managers. The research incorporated extensive literature, including traditional research approaches and life cycle models and emergent literature on organisational learning and growth paths. The growth and non-growth firms were found to be distinct from each other, regardless of industry. The growth firms’ owner-managers had strong growth ambitions and actively sought the recognition and challenges that arise from the operation of multiple growth businesses. The non-growth owner-managers had passive growth ambitions and focused on maintaining their accustomed lifestyle. These differences were also illustrated in the firms’ approaches to networking, internationalisation and technological advancement. The growth firm owner-managers were all portfolio entrepreneurs and had strong professional networks, which they considered were strategically vital. In contrast, the non-growth owner-managers were novice entrepreneurs and were nonchalant towards networking. Innovation and flexibility were identified as important characteristics in the long-term performance of the firms. Findings also indicated that owner-managers’ perceptions of their external business environment determined the influence it had on the business. Individual and collective learning processes underpin these findings in determining long-term growth performance of the firms. The strong interrelationships between owner-managers, learning processes, and longitudinal growth paths suggest areas of future research.

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As one of the salient public relations practitioners' functions, internal and external communication is a vital tool to create success for an organization. This study examined an internal and external theory: Theory X and Y and Grunig's public relations models to ascertain the intersections of these two areas of communication.The researcher utilized a Likert-type questionnaire which was oriented to Theory X and Y, and a Q sort which was oriented to Grunig's public relations models to 35 individuals that assumed a public relations managers' role.Upon analysis of results, the research showed that there was no relationship between organizational internal management style and organizational external communication style. Specifically, Theory X and Y was not related to Grunig's public relations models. Also, there were less intersections and effects regarding the demographics with this study. However, the researcher found that five out of six respondents with 10 or more years of experience supported the proposed research questions. / Department of Journalism

The importance of small firms in a country’s development cannot be over-emphasized. In particular, it is important for them to grow in order to sustain their contributions to a country’s economy. Studies have shown how firms achieve growth using the traditional model of decision making (causation) in which planning, market research and forecasting are used to gain relevant information about the firm’s market/industry. This planning enables the firms to compete favourably with other existing firms in the market. Effectuation as an alternative theory involves decision-making processes under conditions of uncertainty where there is no adequate knowledge of the market due to its latent and emerging nature. Effectuation has been used to examine various concepts in entrepreneurship, but there has been no real effort to apply it to the growth of small knowledge-intensive firms (SKIFs). This study, based on in-depth interviews with six SKIFs, highlights how effectuation can be applied to the growth of SKIFs and it examines how the four underlying principles of contingencies, affordable loss, strategic relationships and adaptation contribute to SKIF growth. In addition, elements of causation are also shown to be relevant, leading to the conclusion that the two models can be used jointly to achieve growth of SKIFs.

The flow of foreign direct investment has long been regarded as the main engine of growth in developing countries. Lebanon has aimed at attracting foreign direct investment to contribute to its economic recovery in the post-civil war period. EU countries were expected to be a major source of investment inflows, partly, due to their rich historical relationship, and partly, as an expected result of the new Euro-Med approach, adopted in the 1990s.This thesis assesses the EU private business interests in Lebanon during the reconstruction period, and investigates to what extent EU business engagements involved FDI. Within this framework, this thesis examines the role of the EU in encouraging the flow of EU private investments into Lebanon. This thesis falls into two parts. The first assesses the history of economic relations between Lebanon and Europe in the modern period, and the development of these relations after the establishment of the EC, examining the role of the latter in reshaping these relations. It also assesses the development of the Lebanese economy since independence from France. In the second part of the thesis, the theoretical framework of FDI is applied to a survey of EU private businesses operating in Lebanon. This helped in answering two questions: what business activities did involve FDI, and why EU firms engagement in FDI was very shallow. The thesis concludes that the lack of FDI activities in Lebanon, whether EU or non-EU, was a result of the lack of comparative location-specific advantages. It also suggests that the Lebanese government should assume a stronger role in improving Lebanon’s comparative advantages in order to attract FDI. The EU should provide substantial help - within the Euro-Med approach - to encourage EU private business investments in the country.