The literature on sustainable development has largely focused on investigating the relationship between companies' environmental and economic performance. However, many aspects remain unexplored, and ...empirical studies are far from reaching a consensus due to the heterogeneity of the environmental and economic measures and methodologies used. This study contributes to the literature on sustainable development by considering a panel of 998 US companies observed over the period 2003–2017 using both traditional panel data methods and an unconditional quantile regression technique. The empirical evidence confirms that environmental performance, measured in terms of environmental orientation and environmental innovation, positively affects returns on assets and equity. It also demonstrates that these returns change across quantiles and depend on the capacity of green companies to generate the same streams of income as nongreen companies but with less capital. In other words, green firms tend to be more efficient in generating future wealth.
The paper investigates the existence of an Open Regional Innovation System (ORIS model). This model is characterised by the firms’ adoption of an open innovation strategy, which overcomes not only ...the boundaries of the firms but also the boundaries of the region.
Using data collected in a sample of life science firms, our research provides the evidence that the Emilia Romagna RIS has evolved towards an ORIS model, where firms’ innovation search strategy, despite being still embedded in local nets (involving several regional public research organisations – PROs), is open to external-to-the-region research networks and knowledge sources. It also shows that innovation openness influences significantly the firms’ innovative performance.
Public procurement tenders (PPTs) represent one of the largest sources of income for construction companies; the identification of factors that could favour the winning of these projects becomes more ...and more interesting. Our work aims to explore how firm-specific capabilities (project management, project administration and innovation) and the geography of its business network shape the success of contractors in winning PPTs, measured as the average value of projects won by the firms. We propose an empirical study of contractors involved in public procurement projects in the construction industry in three Italian regions from 2008 to 2012 employing a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis. This methodology allows analysing how different combinations of causal conditions contribute to an outcome. Our research highlights that there are three successful strategies for firms attempting to obtain high-value PPT projects: (1) invest in high-level project management capabilities, engage in business networks with distant clients and intensify innovation capacity; (2) invest in high-level project administration capabilities, engage in business networks with local clients and suppliers (within 100 km), report a large number of certifications and show a high innovation capacity; and (3) invest in growth strategies to increase the size of the company.
This study explores if there is a convergence between the concepts of fashion and eco-friendliness in consumer perception of a fashion brand. We assume that increased eco-friendly perception will ...influence the brand image positively, with this impact being much higher for luxury than for high and fast fashion brands. The hypotheses are tested using data collected from Twitter. We analyzed the fashion clothing brands with the highest number of followers on the Socialbakers list and applied a novel social network mining methodology that allows measuring the relationship between each brand and two perceptual attributes (fashion and eco-friendliness). The method is based on attribute exemplars—that is, Twitter accounts that represent a perceptual attribute. Our exemplars catalyze social media conversations on fashion (identified in our research by the keywords “fashion,” “glamour,” and “style”) and eco-friendliness (keywords “environment” and “ethical business”). Based on social network analysis theory, we computed a similarity function between the followers of the exemplars and those of the brand. The results suggest that there is a correlation between the fashion and the eco-friendliness perceptual attributes of a brand; however, this correlation is far stronger for luxury brands than for high and fast fashion brands. The difference in the correlations confirms the recent tendency of fashion luxury brand to increasingly consider treating environmental issues as part of their core business and not just as added value to the brand’s offer.
•Eco-friendliness is becoming a fundamental component of the value proposition of fashion brands.•There is strong correlation between the fashion and the eco-friendliness perceptual attributes of luxury brands.•Consumers are more sensitive to fashion brands’ environmental rather than ethical business practices.
Numerous substantial challenges confront both individuals and society in the contemporary era. These encompass issues such as economic disparities, climate change, political polarization, and health ...crises such as the recent COVID-19 pandemic. These multifaceted challenges possess the potential to wield profound repercussions on the lives of individuals, business communities, societies, and the global landscape as well as to stimulate original patterns of responsible innovation. Addressing them necessitates a strategic blend of short-term remedies and far-reaching planning endeavours. Within the scope of this research, the manuscript elucidates the pivotal role of social innovation, exaptation, and retrovation as pioneering modes of responsible innovation uniquely suited to address the prevailing societal conundrums. Furthermore, it will explore the facilitative capacity of knowledge networks, positioning them as instruments that catalyze the implementation of these innovative strategies. Lastly, the article will deliberate upon the prospective trajectories within the domain of responsible innovation.
This paper explores the emergence of B Corp as a new research field through a bibliometric analysis of the B Corp literature, based on a database of 142 documents collected by Scopus and published ...between 2009 and 2020. This emergent field is an important component of the structural change occurring in our society, which, in recent years, has seen the emergence of new for‐profit organisational forms with a strong social consciousness. The bibliometric analysis reveals the foundational works and the historical evolution of the research field, pinpointing the connections between similar concepts in the literature on sustainable enterprises, such as B Corp, hybrid organisation, benefit corporation, and corporate social responsibility. Through a social network analysis, we sustain a relational view of B Corp research, and propose a taxonomy of concepts and terminology, which shows that the concept of B Corp defines an emergent organisational form.
Promoting the circularity of business practices and product offerings is a pivotal process in increasing the value of circular products, coming with a still underestimated effect on market response ...and, thus, firm performance. This study investigates the communication intensity of companies adopting circular economy (CE) practices, here with the aim of assessing the extent to which promoting circularity increases their economic performance (measured as return on assets—ROA), disentangling this effect for the different quantiles of the ROA distribution. Employing a unique web-scraped dataset of companies’ websites, we captured and analyzed the online promotional efforts of a sample of Italian manufacturing companies engaged in CE practices. Our results show that small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that fall into the lower-medium–performing range might benefit from intensively signaling their circularity on their website. Theoretical and managerial implications are put forward.
•Web communications of circular practices is a promising tool for SMEs.•Low-performing companies need to invest heavily in signaling their circular practices to gain competitive advantage.•High-performing SMEs do not experience additional benefits from their CE-focused web communications.
The digitalization of cultural heritage is crucial for revamping the creative and cultural sectors during a period of stagnation. This work is about the revitalization of the Kyoto kimono cluster ...through digitalization, which initiated a new exaptive development path for a declining cluster. A growing community of economic geographers and regional scientists has begun to discuss regional path development beyond related and unrelated diversification. We focus on path renewal, which involves major change of a path into a new direction based on new technologies or organizational innovations. Existing knowledge and skills in a region are combined in new ways and may be linked to relevant extra-regional knowledge to provide new knowledge, enabling innovation and entrepreneurship in the region. The process encompasses the intentional and serendipitous actions of individual entrepreneurs (firm-level) and networks of systemic configurations (system-level). A narrative approach is used to capture the path renewal dynamics in the Kyoto kimono cluster.
The innovation performance of regions is increasingly dependent on the capacity of firms to rely on collaborative networks to develop new products, services, and processes. This work adopts a ...systemic approach to explore the collaborative innovation strategies of small and medium enterprises (SMEs), identifying the existence of multiple combinations of collaborative networks associated with high innovation performance. We conduct a configurational analysis to study the innovation performance of a sample of manufacturing SMEs in the Veneto region and obtain several interesting results. First, we identify eight configurations of open innovation (OI) strategies associated with the same outcome, i.e. high innovation performance. Second, we identify a dual mode of OI, stemming from the presence or absence of an in-house R&D lab. In particular, non-R&D SMEs rely on knowledge-intensive business services as innovation knowledge brokers. Third, start-up companies emerge as OI champions, sourcing both technology-driven and customer-driven knowledge from a wide variety of partners.
Our work aims to analyze the inter-organizational relationships of contractors in public procurement projects. We investigate how a contractor's network position affects his success in winningpublic ...procurement projects, measured as the average value of projects won. To accomplish this objective, we adopt a social network analysis approach. Our evidence come from an empirical analysis of the network positions of general contractors involved in public procurement projects in the construction industry in the Veneto region from 2008 to 2012. We explore through social network measures how partnering ability influences organizational success in winning public procurement projects. We identify three components of partnering ability: breadth; reach; brokerage. Only the first is crucial in determining the success of firms in public procurement practices. Managers involved in public procurement projects in the construction industry should invest in nurturing their partnering abilities by connecting to many partners to be involved in future projects.
•SNA provides tools for investigating the inter-organizational relationships among contractors in public procurement projects•Partnering ability in public procurement practices significantly shape the success of contractors.•Breadth highly impacts firm success in public procurement practices•Reachness poorly impacts firm success in public procurement practices•Brokerage negatively impacts firm success in public procurement practices
PDF
