This thesis examines how industry differences affect both corporate financial policies and valuation. Chapter 1 studies the impact of a firm‟s product market power, through the channel of business risk, on its dividend policy. Using three measures of market power – the Herfindahl-Hirschman index, the degree of import competition and the Lerner Index, I find that market power positively affects a firm‟s dividend decision, both in terms of the probability of paying a dividend and the amount of the dividend. I also provide evidence that the route through which market power affects the dividend decision is business risk: a firm with greater market power is less risky and hence more likely to pay dividends and pay more dividends. Chapter 2 examines industry differences on the level of corporate cash holdings since the 1970s with a focus on high-tech versus non-high-tech firms. In contrast to the average cash-to-assets ratio of non-high-tech firms, which remained stable at a level close to that of the 1970s, the average cash ratio of high-tech firms more than tripled from 1980 to 2007. I find that this difference can be explained by changing firm characteristics across these two industrial sectors. This is due to high-tech new listings, whose changing characteristics and increasing proportion have caused the population characteristics of the high-tech sector to tilt toward those typical of firms that hold more cash. Chapter 3 investigates the industry impact on the marginal value of corporate cash holdings and how it has evolved over time. I find that on average the difference in the marginal value of cash between high-tech and non-high-tech firms has become larger during the sub-period which covers the 1990s and 2000s, as compared to earlier time periods. Furthermore, I show that this increase can be explained by changing firm characteristics related to the precautionary demand for holding cash. Overall, this thesis shows that industry differences, represented by varying degrees of market power and changing firm characteristics, have significantly affected corporate financial policies, both in terms of dividend policy and optimal cash holdings.

This thesis examines how industry differences affect both corporate financial policies and valuation. Chapter 1 studies the impact of a firm‟s product market power, through the channel of business risk, on its dividend policy. Using three measures of market power – the Herfindahl-Hirschman index, the degree of import competition and the Lerner Index, I find that market power positively affects a firm‟s dividend decision, both in terms of the probability of paying a dividend and the amount of the dividend. I also provide evidence that the route through which market power affects the dividend decision is business risk: a firm with greater market power is less risky and hence more likely to pay dividends and pay more dividends. Chapter 2 examines industry differences on the level of corporate cash holdings since the 1970s with a focus on high-tech versus non-high-tech firms. In contrast to the average cash-to-assets ratio of non-high-tech firms, which remained stable at a level close to that of the 1970s, the average cash ratio of high-tech firms more than tripled from 1980 to 2007. I find that this difference can be explained by changing firm characteristics across these two industrial sectors. This is due to high-tech new listings, whose changing characteristics and increasing proportion have caused the population characteristics of the high-tech sector to tilt toward those typical of firms that hold more cash. Chapter 3 investigates the industry impact on the marginal value of corporate cash holdings and how it has evolved over time. I find that on average the difference in the marginal value of cash between high-tech and non-high-tech firms has become larger during the sub-period which covers the 1990s and 2000s, as compared to earlier time periods. Furthermore, I show that this increase can be explained by changing firm characteristics related to the precautionary demand for holding cash. Overall, this thesis shows that industry differences, represented by varying degrees of market power and changing firm characteristics, have significantly affected corporate financial policies, both in terms of dividend policy and optimal cash holdings.

During recent years corporations have been focusing on revenues rather than profits. This led to decreased margins and unstable financial performances. To increase profits, new pricing strategies have emerged. One promising pricing strategy that focuses on increasing profits is value-based pricing, which constitutes the monetising of customer perceived value. The purpose of this paper is to identify what factors influence customer perceived value in the global high-tech service industry. With this knowledge corporations can draw precise evaluations of customer perceived value and hence utilise value-based pricing in the best possible way. A qualitative method was used to study the case of MB Services, the service division of the Meyer Burger Technology Group, and the global high-tech service industry represented at the Hannovermesse 2011, an industrial exhibition in Hanover, Germany. The empirical data collected was analysed together with the theoretical framework. The findings are that customer perceived value of high-tech services is influenced by the overall benefits the customer can obtain from the service, the sacrifices in terms of costs the customer has to pay for the service, competitors’ offerings, different segments, subjective judgments of distinctive people within a corporation, and the industries’ and customers’ level of maturity. Customer perceived value is an underresearched subject, which requires further investigation.

Abstract National lands are important resources of a country as well as important tools of a government for implement of its policies. National lands are usually released in different ways and for development and utilization of different purposes from short-term lease to medium- or long-term lease; appraisal for superficies right; sale of land ownership; and from appropriation of lands to the competent authorities in charge of the relevant industries to management and operation of the lands by land authorities. Different ways of land release will bring about different policy effects and financial effects. Therefore, to attain certain goals of policies, the central government will make use of different ways to release lands for meeting different needs. In the past, when it is necessary to develop and utilize National lands for special development purposes, the public lands will become the targets of such development in most cases, and the competent government authorities in charge of the relevant industries usually play a leading role in the development. However, this is not the case in the recent ¡§Ting Pu High-tech Industrial Park Development Project¡¨ of Taipei County Government. In the project, the non-public lands became objectives of development rather than the public lands under the control of National Property Administration (NPA), Ministry of Finance. The project, through public selection procedure, recruits investors to participate in the development of the lands. As a result, three high-tech companies including Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd. entered the park and built factories there. So the project should be considered as a successful case of land release. In recent years, NPA took over some lands from the Taiwan Provincial Government and commissioned the local governments to manage those lands. In addition, NPA started to take over the national assets from various organizations and state-run enterprises. It is anticipated that there will be a great deal of state-owned non-public lands to be released by NPA at the proper time and in proper ways for development and utilizations. In this way, the state-owned lands will have the opportunities to develop their functions. This study probes into the innovative development mold of Ting Pu High-tech Industrial Park and discuss the successful factors and existing problems of the park. It is hope that this study may provide the government a better method to create the utilization value of the lands and further to promote development of the country¡¦s economy and prosperity of the society. Finally, the research submits the following suggests: (1) The government should establish a land reserve system to enhance the power and function of land distribution and develop the functions of the public lands and its role in development of society and economy. (2) Currently, there are five types of industrial lands in the country, and they compete with one another to strive for resources and sources of customers. So, an integration of those lands becomes essential. (3) An incentive system should be established to encourage the local governments to take actions that suit local circumstances and develop the industries with local features. The government departments may also take the opportunities to release more public-owned lands for development and utilization of land in order to increase the land use value and create higher economic effect. Key words¡GNational land development mold¡ATing pu High-tech Industrial Park

The main topic of discussion of this research is about the functions and role-played by high-tech human resources employees and to confirm what are the key factors needed to assure success at the role they play? How to maximize human resources functions and role they play to achieve the goal of empowering the industry¡¦s added value and efficiency, this is to be the main consideration of a human resources expert personnel in self-improvement. Ulrich¡¦s role vantage point was used in this research during observation, 4- role structure was applied and 20 appraisal standard tests were designed. Through experts¡¦ discussion and comparison to confirm the importance of 4 role structures, the order according to it¡¦s importance are the following: 1. Strategic human resources management 2. Employees contribution management 3. Company basic constructive management 4. Transformation and changes management. The Analytical Hierarchy Process AHP was applied during the processing of this research, after sorting and organizing the experts¡¦ evaluation and comparison of each role structure, the result shows that, 1.In high-tech industry human resources role structure comparison, the strategic human resources management is the most importance with a highest importance value of 43.9%, the other structures value of importance are: Employees contribution management 21%, company basis constructive management 18.4% and transformation and changes management 16.7%. The results conform with Ulrich¡¦s (1997) view about the human resources experts¡¦ emphasis should shift from ¡§doing the things¡¨ to¡¨ achievable result¡¨. 2.Fitzenz (1993) thinks that the organization and human resources management can lead to high-performance results. It encourages people to join the organization it should join, continue to produce high production rate, long-term organization commitment and maintain the competitive edge, the result of this research also conforms to that opinion. In the high-tech industry where the competition is stiff, to be able to maximize the human resources cost is the greatest benefit. Employees¡¦ contribution management has always been the main important point at work, that¡¦s why it is next important to the strategic human resources management, it is worth for human resources personnel to pay more attention to. 3.This research¡¦s scope is only within the high-tech industry, it was found that the transformation and changing management¡¦s less important than the other 3 structure, it did not receive much attention contrary to the general opinion that high-tech industry demands more change. As a logical conclusion, due to difference in company life cycle, product life cycle, level of technical R&D, therefore the degree of these needs are not the same, moreover, changes needs the support of the higher management and a proper timing, also, it cannot be executed at the same time so it¡¦s actual level of importance was limited. 4.Human resources strategy must be in consolidated with the enterprise strategy this research matches several scholars¡¦ opinion. In the 20 items of evaluation standard, the most important structural phase is the strategic human resources management where 3 items were included in the first 5 items of the evaluation standard. The items included are: coordinating the human resources matters and operation strategy comparative importance 14.1%, cooperate with enterprise goal in setting the human resources strategy, comparative importance 11.5%, joining the drafting of business operations strategy, comparative importance8.2%, this only shows that strategic human resources management is the most crucial key structure phase.

In order to survive in the intense competition environment, every company tries to find the way to strengthen its core competences efficiently and to gain more competitive advantages. Therefore, more and more companies start to outsource their non-core value activities in order to focus their limited resources on constructing and developing their core competences. However, when adopting outsourcing policies¡]including function outsourcing and job outsourcing¡^, companies need to review every characteristics of their jobs and sort them by organization targets or goals. Thus, they will figure out those ¡§non-core jobs¡¨, and seek the way to differentiate their own employment strategies between core and non-core jobs. Due to the idea of outsourcing, another employment type is triggered¡Xnamely employee dispatching. However, it is important to know what causes companies adopting employee dispatching. Is it the same reason as outsourcing, namely to strengthen core competences? Or is it just to minimize the operating costs? Or to avoid the legal liabilities which every company should follow. In this study, we interview the HR managers that have the authority to make the decisions in the four high-tech. companies. The aims of this research are as follows; to find out how those companies make the dispatching decisions, what the real causes are, how to choose contractors, and how to evaluate the effects of adopting employee dispatching. By consolidating and analyzing those research data, we hope that this study can shed some light on this area, provide decision making suggestions, and new research perspectives of employment shift in this study. Meanwhile, these findings can be of use for further research in this area in the future. After consolidating the data we gathered, we find: 1.Companies adopt dispatched workers to replace regular employees when considering personnel expense cost down and legal liabilities avoidance. 2.From the practicing of implementing dispatched workers, those four companies learned how to set the scope of non-core jobs for outsourcing further more. 3.The following three key factors: Specialty, Finance, and Service, can be used to help those who want to use employee dispatching to select their partners. 4.Dispatch companies just provide the only function, outsourcing employees, to their corporate customers. They have no ability to provide the other business functions. 5.For long-term planning, those enterprises have moved to China due to globalization expansion of their suppliers and customers to China market. Therefore, they will hire dispatching employees instead to fulfill those non-core jobs in Taiwan.

The small and medium enterprises have been recognized as the main factor for the economic miracle in Taiwan. With fading ¡§dot com¡¨ companies and global economic depression, Taiwan academia, industry and government authorities have worked hard to propose numerous suggestions as well as policies, hopefully to build the competitive strength on the international trade market. High-tech industry is expected as the most significant part in the twenty-first century where knowledge and technology play the essential roles. Such industry also pertains high risks because of the fast changing technology. Hence, the innovation spirits of enterprises that continuously dedicate to technological R&D enable them to react the dynamic market efficiently. This study proposed several influent factors for enterprise performance. Three independent variables are enterpreneurship, technology strategy, and external network: the enterpreneurship includes innovativeness, risk taking, and proactiveness; the technology strategy refers to pioneering, internal R&D, external sources, patenting, and forecasting; in addition, the external network means the external linkages of the enterprise, such as consultants, alliances, association, financial institution, research institution, and government. Performance was measured by subjective perception containin sale growth, market share, ROI, and profitability. This study adopts questionnaires to collect data. Eight hundred and forty-four questionnaires were mailed to CEOs of Computer manufacture companies and IC manufacture companies in Taiwan. After one month, eighty-two responses were received. After statistic analysis, the results are: (1) those firms that stood for more than ten years or have more than 200 employees showed better performance; (2) several factors showed significant positive correlation with performance, including product innovativeness & risk taking in the entrepreneurship, pioneering & external sources in technology strategy, and research institution & government, alliances, and association in external network; (3) entrepreneurship, technology strategy, and external network were mutually positive correlated. Finally, based on the research findings, this study proposes conclusions and suggestions for managers or entrepreneurs in the directions of strategy planning and decision-making. Keywords¡GEnterpreneurship, Technology Strategy, External Network, Performance, High-tech Firms

This thesis studies innovation networks, R&D spillovers, spatial spillovers, productivity growth and associated adjustments in Taiwan high-technology industries. A dynamic production modeling is built up to estimate R&D and its spillover effects among and within high-technology industries to study the dynamic effects of inter-, intra-industry R&D and spatial spillovers and exogenous technical changes on output growth for Taiwan high-technology industries. The thesis involves analysis of R&D spillover effects among and within high-technology industries to study the dynamic perspectives of the innovation diffusion. As leading high-technology and network expand the horizons of economic agents¡¦ production possibilities and decisions, the spillovers between productive entities are likely to be of increasing importance in the knowledge-based economy. Understanding these productive inter-dependencies, and their potential to motivate various types of spillovers require modeling and measuring their existence and impacts. We provide a conceptual and empirical framework for measuring and evaluating various types of spillover mechanism, which allows us both to quantify the cost-effects and evaluating the contribution to productive performance. We explore the temporal, spatial, and industrial spillovers using a dynamic cost function model that explicitly parameterizes the spillover weights and econometrically estimates them. We extend the dynamic external spillover model framework, described in Tsai and Chen (2001), which assumed that each firm derives an optimal plan so that the expected present value of current and future costs stream is minimized. First, we study the spillover effects in the dimension of industry considerations and geography. Second, to identify all kinds of spillover sources, to assess the spillover processes, and to evaluate the contributions of such inter-dependencies in productive performance we incorporate the concept of spillover ratio into the industry dynamic model. The temporal, intra-industry, inter-industry, and spatial R&D spillovers are distinguished and, in doing so, provide a richer account of innovation, learning and the means which are encouraged by geographical proximity.

Nowadays, outsouring is quite popular and acceptable in business usage. In recent years, HR outsourcing has become a popular and known knowledge , and outsourcing on training is one of important strategies in HR outsourcing. However, the related academic research on the training outsourcing is as limited as a virgin field. Therefore, this study will evaluate if businesses use training outsourcing to achieve human resource flexibility and upgrade the organization performances, and to understand how the High-Tech Industry uses it and its affects . This study uses 40 data of Hsin-Chu Science-Based Industrial Park companies from both questionnaire form and interview survey in order to understand the usage status, usage reason, its problem and key successful factors of the training outsourcing on the High-Tech Industry. From the returned questionnaires, we found that 100% of the companies implement ¡§Training¡¨ and 95% of the companies take training outsourcing, but also found that the degree of training of outsourcing is not so popular as its usage status and most of companies prefer to do it by themselves. In addition, we also found that the demand degree of training outsourcing is much higher on the specific profession course than management and general training. The result shows the companies are required to use outside vendors for specific profession. According to the result of statistic analysis, we examine Hypothesis 1 and find the amount of staff and revenue are positive related with training outsourcing and are also positively affected , so it shows if the business scope is smaller, the degree of the training outsourcing will be higher. The result of Hypothesis 2, Human Resource Flexibility also positively affect the training outsourcing, especially the functional flexibility which meant as the degree of Flexibility is higher, the degree of training outsourcing will be also higher. The result of Hypothesis 3, training outsourcing is only positively affected to the organizational performance of ¡§ deducted Staff cost¡¨. According to the result of the interviews, we found the main reason that high-tech industry uses training outsourcing is due to lack of interior professional speaker; to strength the learning opportunity and experience of staffs to get-in the required professional skill and knowledge from the outside provider and to improve the competition ability; to improve the training quality and no specific department to take charge of training. The main problems for training outsourcing are the contents of training cannot match with the staff¡¦s need, the factor of outside speaker and what the staff learned from outside course cannot practice on the jobs. The role of Human Resource people during outsourcing play the administration service role, and sometimes can also play the strategic role, but in just a few cases. So, the result shows the training outsourcing is not quite the important mission in a company and still in a low level job. The key factor to make outsourcing successful is the cooperation and profession from the outside vendor, the support of high-level manager, the contents to match with the business strategy and goal , and the contents can match with the need of staff and company.

This research focuses on training bundles, nonstandard work arrangement and their relationship in high-tech industry, and the conclusions are listed as follows, 1. Training bundles and training effectiveness Training practicability has a positive impact on employee productivity, company profitability, innovation and reduction of employee turnover rates. Training institutionalization has a positive impact on employee productivity and company profitability. Rather than reducing employee turnover rates, training has the greater positive impact on employee productivity. Furthermore, larger organizations have higher level of training practicability. 2. Nonstandard work arrangement in high-tech industry As the data showed, over 80% companies ever had nonstandard work arrangement in 2002, and in the companies that had such arrangement, fixed-term hires and subcontractors were mostly used. To adjust for business fluctuations and reduce administrative workload are first two reasons why companies use nonstandard work arrangement. Limited head count and personnel cost saving are also important factors to hire nonstandard workers. In particular, cost saving is the most important factor for companies to use subcontractors. About the occupational structure, most nonstandard workers are either present in the position of administration or production. Only subcontractors are most present in the service occupations such as janitors, cleaners or caterers. With regard to personnel cost saving, compare to using dispatched workers, part-time workers and fixed-term hires are more helpful to reduce the personnel cost. 3. Training bundles and nonstandard work arrangement The result indicates that the level of training bundles can not be the determinant of using nonstandard work arrangement. Besides, we found that organization size has a positive effect on using nonstandard work arrangement, fixed-term hires, dispatched workers and subcontractors.