Spillovers from Foreign Direct Investment in Central and Eastern Europe. An index for measuring a country’s potential to benefit from technology spillovers

In the paper, we construct a composite indicator to estimate the potential of four Central and Eastern European countries (the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) to benefit from productivity spillovers from foreign direct investment (FDI) in the manufacturing sector. Such transfers of technology are one of the main benefits of FDI for the host country, and should also be one of the main determinants of FDI incentives offered to investing multinationals by governments, but they are difficult to assess ex ante. For our composite index, we use six components to proxy the main channels and determinants of these spillovers. We have tried several weighting and aggregation methods, and we consider our results robust. According to the analysis of our results, between 2003 and 2007 all four countries were able to increase their potential to benefit from such spillovers, although there are large differences between them. The Czech Republic clearly has the most potential to benefit from productivity spillovers, while Poland has the least. The relative positions of Hungary and Slovakia depend to some extent on the exact weighting and aggregation method of the individual components of the index, but the differences are not large. These conclusions have important implication both the investment strategies of multinationals and government FDI policies.

Measuring Benefits of Technology Spillovers from Foreign Direct Investment in Central and Eastern Europe

In this paper, we construct a composite indicator to estimate the potential of four Central and Eastern European countries (the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) to benefit from productivity spillovers from foreign direct investment (FDI) in the manufacturing sector. Such transfers of technology are one of the main benefits of FDI for the host country, and should also be one of the main determinants of FDI incentives offered to investing multinationals by governments, but they are difficult to assess ex ante. For our composite index, we use six components to proxy the main channels and determinants of these spillovers. We have tried several weighting and aggregation methods, and we consider our results robust. According to the analysis of our results, between 2003 and 2007 all four countries were able to increase their potential to benefit from such spillovers, although there are large differences between them. The Czech Republic clearly has the most potential to benefit from productivity spillovers, while Poland has the least. The relative positions of Hungary and Slovakia depend to some extent on the exact weighting and aggregation method of the individual components of the index, but the differences are not large. These conclusions have important implications both for the investment strategies of multinationals and government FDI policies.

Inventory investment and GDP characteristics in OECD countries

There are very few research studies on macroeconomic inventory behaviour of various countries. It is clear that macro inventories are the results of a large number of individual microdecisions. However, we believe that it is worth analysing how inventories develop in the individual countries and why we can see different tendencies. This paper is the newest piece in a series of studies on the above subject. We use the OECD database to analyse inventory trends between 1987 and 2004 in nine of the most developed economies of the world. Annual inventory investment data are used and their connections with other components of GDP expenditure (governmental and private consumption, investment in fixed assets and foreign trade balance as well as the annual growth rate of GDP) are examined by multi-variable statistical analysis. Conclusions include the steadily decreasing tendency of inventory fluctuations, the varying periods of higher and lower rates of inventory investments and the differences of main influencing factors by country.

Üzleti teljesítménymérés a sportban, - avagy miként segítheti a sportszervezetek vezetőit a Balanced Scorecard koncepció a stratégia szerinti működésben = Measuring Business Performance in Sports - How the Balanced Scorecard approach can help sports organisations in operating along strategic objectives

Napjainkban egyre nagyobb figyelem fordul a sporttevékenység társadalmi hasznosságára, ugyanakkor számos sportszervezet a túléléséért küzd. A legtöbb sportszervezetnél a sportteljesítmény mérése dominál, s viszonylag kevés figyelmet fordítanak az üzleti teljesítmény és az ezt befolyásoló tényezők mérésére, annak ellenére, hogy a vezetők tudatában vannak a sportteljesítmény és az üzleti teljesítmény kölcsönös összefüggésével. A sportteljesítményt a fogyasztói elégedettségen keresztül bevételre kell váltani, illetve biztosítani kell a finanszírozási forrásokat (gondolhatunk akár a játékosok fizetésére) a megfelelő sportteljesítmény eléréséhez. A sportszervezetek vezetőinek át kell látniuk a sportteljesítmény és az üzleti teljesítmény összefüggéseit, és azonosítaniuk kell a kritikus értékteremtő tényezőket. Ehhez adhat egy megfelelő gondolkodási keretet a Balanced Scorecard alkalmazása. Tanulmányunkban egy rövid áttekintést adunk a Balanced Scorecard alkalmazásának előnyeiről és kihívásairól a non-profit szervezetek esetében, majd egy magyarországi kézilabda klubnál készített esettanulmány segítségével megvizsgáljuk a BSC alkalmazási lehetőségét a sportkluboknál. _____ While performance measurement in the sport industry has a traditionally strong focus on sports results, commercial success of sports clubs needs to gain more ground. Sports results should generate market revenues, by satisfying customer needs, and allow continued investment in the further improvement of sports success (i.e. more funds for player transfers and wages). Club managers need to understand the complex relationship between on-field and off-the-field success, and identify critical success factors for achieving strategic objectives. The Balanced Scorecard approach provides a plausible framework for such analysis. Our paper explains the challenges of and opportunities for implementing a Balanced Scorecard system in non-profit organisations, and provides insights into its application in professional sport through an in-depth case study of a handball club in Hungary. We conclude by providing a model for managing sports organisations in line with strategic objectives, balancing out stakeholder expectations for both sports results and commercial success.