Like milk or wine: Does firm performance improve with age?

Our empirical literature review shows that little is known about how firm performance changes with age, presumably because of the paucity of data on firm age. For Spanish manufacturing firms, we analyse the firm performance related to firm age between 1998 and 2006. We find evidence that firms improve with age, because ageing firms are observed to have steadily increasing levels of productivity, higher profits, larger size, lower debt ratios, and higher equity ratios. Furthermore, older firms are better able to convert sales growth into subsequent growth of profits and productivity. On the other hand, we also found evidence that firm performance deteriorates with age. Older firms have lower expected growth rates of sales, profits and productivity, they have lower profitability levels (when other variables such as size are controlled for), and also that they appear to be less capable to convert employment growth into growth of sales, profits and productivity.

Gestió del parmetratge

L'objectiu funcional de l'aplicació és la gestió del parametratge d'una organització, és a dir, de totes aquelles dades de consum horitzontal per part de qualsevol altra aplicació més especialitzada. Aquesta implementació es realitza posant émfasi en aspectes molt importants a nivell empresarial: transaccions i rendiment.

Productivity and innovation spillovers: Micro evidence from Spain

This article analyses the impact that innovation expenditure and intrasectoral and intersectoral externalities have on productivity in Spanish firms. While there is an extensive literature analysing the relationship between innovation and productivity, in this particular area there are far fewer studies that examine the importance of sectoral externalities, especially with the focus on Spain. One novelty of the study, which covers the industrial and service sectors, is that we also consider jointly the technology level of the sector in which the firm operates and the firm size. The database used is the Technological Innovation Panel, PITEC, which includes 12,813 firms for the year 2008 and has been little used in this type of study. The estimation method used is Iteratively Reweighted Least Squares method, IRLS, which is very useful for obtaining robust estimations in the presence of outliers. The results confirm that innovation has a positive effect on productivity, especially in high-tech and large firms. The impact of externalities is more heterogeneous because, while intrasectoral externalities have a poitive and significant effect, especially in low-tech firms independently of size, intersectoral externalities have a more ambiguous effect, being clearly significant for advanced industries in which size has a positive effect.

The Transatlantic Productivity Gap : Is R&D the Main Culprit?

The literature has pointed to different causes to explain the productivity gap between Europe and United States in the last decades. This paper tests the hypothesis that the lower European productivity performance in comparison with the US can be explained not only by a lower level of corporate R&D investment, but also by a lower capacity to translate R&D investment into productivity gains. The proposed microeconometric estimates are based on a unique longitudinal database covering the period 1990-2008 and comprising 1.809 US and European companies for a total of 16.079 observations. Consistent with previous literature, we find robust evidence of a significant impact of R&D on productivity, however – using different estimation techniques - the R&D coefficients for the US firms always turn out to be significantly higher. To see to what extent these transatlantic differences may be related to the different sectoral structures in the US and the EU, we differentiated the analysis by sectors. The result is that both in manufacturing, services and high-tech sectors US firms are more efficient in translating their R&D investments into productivity increases.

L'aigua: costos, preus i eficiència

L"aigua és un recurs natural que té la capacitat de satisfer tot un conjunt de funcions de caire econòmic,social i ambiental. Si tenim en compte la seva dimensió econòmica, l"aigua, com qualsevol altre bé, té un valor per als consumidors que depèn del grau de benestar i satisfacció que n"obtinguin d"utilitzar- la. Tanmateix, determinar quin és aquest valor és una tasca complexa, fonamentalment per dos motius. D"una banda, els consumidors utilitzen l"aigua amb diverses finalitats i, per tant, el valor atorgat no és el mateix en cada tipus d"ús (agricultura,generació d"energia elèctrica, domèstic, industrial,oci). D"altra banda, en no existir un mercat de l"aigua pròpiament dit, cal aplicar una sèrie de mètodes indirectes per estimar-ne el valor en cadascun dels usos finals alternatius, la qual cosa comporta unes dificultats tècniques i d"informació estadística considerables.

Efficiency-based evaluation of aligners for industrial applications

This paper presents a novel efficiencybased evaluation of sentence and word aligners. This assessment is critical in order to make a reliable use in industrial scenarios. The evaluation shows that the resourcesrequired by aligners differ rather broadly. Subsequently, we establish limitation mechanisms on a set of aligners deployed as web services. These results, paired with the quality expected from the aligners, allow providers to choose the most appropriate aligner according to the task at hand.

Internal promotion versus external recruitment: evidence in industrial plants

An analysis is carried out in a sample of 738 industrial plants of the determining factors in the use of internal promotion of blue-collar workers to middle managers and skilled technicians as against their external recruitment. The use of internal promotion is positively correlated with variables indicative of the efforts made by plants to measure employees' skills, and to a lesser extent, with the level of specificity of investments in human capital made by blue-collar workers. Contrary to what was expected, variables related with the use and efficiency of other incentive systems have no significant influence on the increased or decreased use of internal promotion. These results are initial evidence that internal promotions are used to protect and favour specific investments, especially those made by firms in order to discover their workers' skills.

Public enterprise reforms and efficiency in regulated environments: the case of the postal sector

Purpose - This paper focuses on analyzing the effect that public reforms have on the efficiency of state-owned enterprises in regulated environments. Design/methodology/approach - The research is focused in the postal sector where public and private companies must obey a legal framework related to provide a universal service. The analysis is carried out using a panel of 7 European postal operators for the period 1997-2003. The activity analyzed was the letter mail division; we take as key variable the unit cost of a letter and use a translog cost function where as independent variables we include traffic levels, labor cost per employee, quality and availability of the service as well as the type of ownership (public or private). Additionally, in a second stage the geographical differences among countries are considered. Findings - Results indicate that postal operators that experienced organizational changes without being privatized, such as the Spanish and Greek operators, do not have higher unit costs than privatized postal operators like the one of Germany and the Netherlands. Moreover, we find that in all cases the operator of Ireland appear to be the most efficient. In this case restructuring process has been carried out giving an important leadership role to workers. This suggests us that labor culture could be a key variable to study when analyzing reform processes in public enterprises. Originality/value - Our findings show that in a regulated environment like in the postal sector, public and private companies can obtain similar efficiency levels in term of unit costs.

Contagion and efficiency in gross and net interbank payment systems

The increased fragility of the banking industry has generatedgrowing concern about the risks associated with the paymentsystems. Although in most industrial countries differentinterbank payment systems coexist, little is really knownabout their propierties in terms of risk and efficiency. Wetackle this question by comparing the two main types ofpayment systems, gross and net, in a framework whereuncertainty arises from several sources: the time ofconsumption, the location of consumption and the return oninvestment. Payments across locations can be made either bydirectly transferrring liquidity or by transferring claimsagainst the bank in the other location. The two mechanism areinterpreted as the gross and net settlement systems ininterbank payments. We characterize the equilibria in the twosystems and identify the trade-off in terms of safety andefficiency.

The quasi-judicial role of large retailers: An efficiency hypothesis of their relation with suppliers

The paper explores an efficiency hypothesis regarding the contractual process between large retailers, such as Wal-Mart and Carrefour, and their suppliers. The empirical evidence presented supports the idea that large retailers play a quasi-judicial role, acting as "courts of first instance" in their relationships with suppliers. In this role, large retailers adjust the terms of trade to on-going changes and sanction performance failures, sometimes delaying payments. A potential abuse of their position is limited by the need for re-contracting and preserving their reputations. Suppliers renew their confidence in their retailers on a yearly basis, through writing new contracts. This renovation contradicts the alternative hypothesis that suppliers are expropriated by large retailers as a consequence of specific investments.

Evolució i anàlisi del metabolisme ambiental del polígon industrial. El cas de Maó (Menorca)

El polígon industrial de Maó, POIMA, és un dels principals motors econòmics de l’illa de Menorca. La Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) en col·laboració amb l’Observatori Socioambiental de Menorca (OBSAM), ha fet un projecte d’anàlisi de l’evolució històrica i del metabolisme actual del polígon. L’estudi es centra en 5 vectors; usos del sòl, energètic, hídric, materials i mobilitat dels quals les dades han estat obtingudes a partir d’enquestes, entrevistes a les empreses i observacions directes semi-quantitatives. Com a resultat es presenten diverses propostes de millora per augmentar l’eficiència de POIMA, analitzant el potencial d’autosuficiència energètic i hídric, reduint l’impacte ambiental i reutilitzant els residus com a recursos entre empreses, sinèrgies.

Caracterización de las almazaras cooperativas catalanas, análisis interno de la fase industrial o de transformación

En el presente artículo hemos tratado de analizar las características de las almazaras cooperativas catalanas con la finalidad de destacar no solamente sus elementos más importantes de gestión sino también sus principales debilidades.Las cooperativas se consideran instrumentos útiles para acometer políticas de desarrollo económico y bienestar social. A pesar de ello hay un gran debate abierto acerca de la eficiencia de estas organizaciones, que plantean el interrogante de si están en condiciones de competir con éxito en una economía cada vez más abierta, liberalizada y global. A través de las encuestas que hemos realizado al conjunto de las cooperativas oleícolas de Catalunya, hemos podido averiguar sus características distintivas, así como las principales desventajas y problemas a los que se enfrentan. Creemos puede ser de interés analizar las características de estas organizaciones, que tanto desde el punto de vista organizativo como de recursos humanos, como financiero, las hace diferentes de otro tipo de organizaciones pero que sin embargo, han de hacer frente a un mercado cada día más exigente y competitivo.

Energy efficiency determinants: An empirical analysis of Spanish innovative firms

This paper examines the extent to which innovative Spanish firms pursue improvements in energy efficiency (EE) as an objective of innovation. The increase in energy consumption and its impact on greenhouse gas emissions justifies the greater attention being paid to energy efficiency and especially to industrial EE. The ability of manufacturing companies to innovate and improve their EE has a substantial influence on attaining objectives regarding climate change mitigation. Despite the effort to design more efficient energy policies, the EE determinants in manufacturing firms have been little studied in the empirical literature. From an exhaustive sample of Spanish manufacturing firms and using a logit model, we examine the energy efficiency determinants for those firms that have innovated. To carry out the econometric analysis, we use panel data from the Community Innovation Survey for the period 2008‐2011. Our empirical results underline the role of size among the characteristics of firms that facilitate energy efficiency innovation. Regarding company behaviour, firms that consider the reduction of environmental impacts to be an important objective of innovation and that have introduced organisational innovations are more likely to innovate with the objective of increasing energy efficiency. Keywords: energy efficiency, corporate targets, innovation, Community Innovation Survey. JEL Classification: Q40, Q55, O31

Caracterización de las almazaras cooperativas catalanas : análisis interno de la fase industrial o de transformación

En el presente artículo hemos tratado de analizar las características de las almazaras cooperativas catalanas con la finalidad de destacar no solamente sus elementos más importantes de gestión sino también sus principales debilidades. Las cooperativas se consideran instrumentos útiles para acometer políticas de desarrollo económico y bienestar social. A pesar de ello hay un gran debate abierto acerca de la eficiencia de estas organizaciones, que plantean el interrogante de si están en condiciones de competir con éxito en una economía cada vez más abierta, liberalizada y global. A través de las encuestas que hemos realizado al conjunto de las cooperativas oleícolas de Catalunya, hemos podido averiguar sus características distintivas, así como las principales desventajas y problemas a los que se enfrentan. Creemos puede ser de interés analizar las características de estas organizaciones, que tanto desde el punto de vista organizativo como de recursos humanos, como financiero, las hace diferentes de otro tipo de organizaciones pero que sin embargo, han de hacer frente a un mercado cada día más exigente y competitivo

Efficiency and environmental regulation: a 'complex situation'

Production of desirable outputs is often accompanied by undesirable by products that have damaging effects on the environment, and whose disposal is frequently regulated by public authorities. In this paper, we compute directional technology distance functions under particular assumptions concerning disposability of bads in order to test for the existence of what we call ‘complex situations’, where the biggest producer is not the greatest polluter. Furthermore, we show that how in such situations, environmental regulation could achieve an effective reduction in the aggregate level of bad outputs without reducing the production of good outputs. Finally, we illustrate our methodology with an empirical application to a sample of Spanish tile ceramic producers.