• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.193-216
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• 2020

Due to the recent mid- to long-term slump and falling growth rates in the global economy, interest in organizational structures that create new products or services as a new alternative to survive and develop in an opaque environment both internally and externally, and enhance organizational sustainability through changes in production methods and business innovation is increasing day by day. In this atmosphere, we agree that the growth of small and medium-sized venture companies has a significant impact on the national economy, and various efforts are being made to enhance the technological innovation capabilities of the members so that these small and medium-sized venture companies can enhance and sustain their performance. The purpose of this study is also to investigate how the technological innovation capabilities of small and medium-sized venture companies correlate with the performance of knowledge management and to analyze the role of network capabilities to organize the strategic activities of enterprise to obtain the resources and organizational capabilities to be used for value creation from external networks. In other words, research was conducted on the impact of technological innovation capabilities of small and medium venture companies on knowledge management performance by using network capabilities as parameters. Therefore, in this study, we would like to verify the hypothesis that innovation capabilities will have a positive impact on knowledge management performance by using network capabilities of small and medium venture companies. Economic activities based on technological innovation capabilities should respond quickly to new changes in an environment where uncertainty has increased, and lead to macro-economic growth and development as well as overcoming long-term economic downturns so that they can become the nation's new growth engine as well as sustainable growth and survival of the organization. In addition, this study was conducted by setting the most important knowledge management performance within the organization as a dependent variable. As a result, R&D and learning capabilities among technological innovation capabilities have no impact on financial performance. In contrast, it was shown that corporate innovation activities have a positive impact on both financial and non-financial performance. The fact that non-financial factors such as quality and productivity improvement are identified in the management of small and medium-sized venture companies utilizing their technological innovation capabilities is contrary to a number of studies by those corporate innovation activities affect financial performance during prior research. The reason for this result is that research companies have been out of start-up companies for more than seven years, but sales are less than 10 billion won, and unlike start-up companies, R&D and learning capabilities have more positive effects on intangible non-financial performance than financial performance. Corporate innovation activities have been shown to have a positive (+) impact on both financial and non-financial performance, while R&D and learning capabilities have a positive (+) impact on financial performance by parameters of network capability. Corporate innovation activities have been shown to have no impact on both financial and non-financial performance, and R&D and learning capabilities have no impact on non-financial performance. It could be seen that the parameter effects of network competency are limited to when R&D and learning competencies are derived from quantitative financial performance. It could be seen that the parameter effects of network competency are limited to when R&D and learning competencies are derived from quantitative financial performance.

• The Journal of Small Business Innovation
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.19-39
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• 2016

With increasing adoption of smart products and complexity, companies have shifted their strategies from stand alone and competitive strategies to business ecosystem oriented and cooperative strategies. The win-win growth of business refers to corporate efforts undertaken by companies to pursue the healthiness of business between conglomerates and partnering companies such as suppliers for mutual prosperity and a long-term corporate soundness based on their business ecosystem and cooperative strategies. This study is designed to validate a theoretical proposition that the win-win growth strategy of Samsung Electronics and cooperative efforts among companies can create a healthy business ecosystem, based on results of case studies and surveys. In this study, a level of global market access of small and mid-sized companies is adopted as the key achievement index. The foreign market entry is considered as one of vulnerabilities in the ecosystem of small and mid-sized enterprises (SMEs). For SMEs, the global market access based on the research and development (R&D) has become the critical component in the process of transforming them into global small giants. The results of case studies and surveys are analyzed mainly based on a model of a virtuous cycle of Creativity, Opportunity, Productivity, and Proactivity (the COPP model) that features the characteristics of the healthiness of a business ecosystem. In the COPP model, a virtuous circle of profits made by the first three factors and Proactivity, which is the manifestation of entrepreneurship that proactively invests and reacts to the changing business environment of the future, enhances the healthiness of a given business ecosystem. With the application of the COPP model, this study finds major achievements of the win-win growth of Samsung Electronics as follows. First, Opportunity plays a role as a parameter in the relations of Creativity, Productivity, and creating profits. Namely, as companies export more (with more Opportunity), they are more likely to link their R&D efforts to Productivity and profitability. However, companies that do not export tend to fail to link their R&D investment to profitability. Second, this study finds that companies with huge investment on R&D for the future, which is the result of Proactivity, tend to hold a large number of patents (Creativity). And companies with significant numbers of patents tend to be large exporters as well (Opportunity), and companies with a large amount of exports tend to record high profitability (Productivity and profitability), and thus forms the virtuous cycle of the COPP model. In addition, to access global markets for sustainable growth, SMEs need to build and strengthen their competitiveness. This study concludes that companies with a high level of proactivity to invest for the future can create a virtuous circle of Creativity, Opportunity, Productivity, and Proactivity, thereby providing a strategic implication that SMEs should invest time and resources in forming such a virtuous cycle which is a sure way for the SMEs to grow into global small giants.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.151-171
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• 2014

Firms today have sought management effectiveness and efficiency utilizing information technologies (IT). Numerous firms are outsourcing specific information systems functions to cope with their short of information resources or IT experts, or to reduce their capital cost. Recently, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) as a new type of information system has become one of the powerful outsourcing alternatives. SaaS is software deployed as a hosted and accessed over the internet. It is regarded as the idea of on-demand, pay-per-use, and utility computing and is now being applied to support the core competencies of clients in areas ranging from the individual productivity area to the vertical industry and e-commerce area. In this study, therefore, we seek to quantify the value that SaaS has on business performance by examining the relationships among firm strategies, SaaS technology maturity, and business performance of SaaS providers. We begin by drawing from prior literature on SaaS, technology maturity and firm strategy. SaaS technology maturity is classified into three different phases such as application service providing (ASP), Web-native application, and Web-service application. Firm strategies are manipulated by the low-cost strategy and differentiation strategy. Finally, we considered customer acquisition as a business performance. In this sense, specific objectives of this study are as follows. First, we examine the relationships between customer acquisition performance and both low-cost strategy and differentiation strategy of SaaS providers. Secondly, we investigate the mediating and moderating effects of SaaS technology maturity on those relationships. For this purpose, study collects data from the SaaS providers, and their line of applications registered in the database in CNK (Commerce net Korea) in Korea using a questionnaire method by the professional research institution. The unit of analysis in this study is the SBUs (strategic business unit) in the software provider. A total of 199 SBUs is used for analyzing and testing our hypotheses. With regards to the measurement of firm strategy, we take three measurement items for differentiation strategy such as the application uniqueness (referring an application aims to differentiate within just one or a small number of target industry), supply channel diversification (regarding whether SaaS vendor had diversified supply chain) as well as the number of specialized expertise and take two items for low cost strategy like subscription fee and initial set-up fee. We employ a hierarchical regression analysis technique for testing moderation effects of SaaS technology maturity and follow the Baron and Kenny's procedure for determining if firm strategies affect customer acquisition through technology maturity. Empirical results revealed that, firstly, when differentiation strategy is applied to attain business performance like customer acquisition, the effects of the strategy is moderated by the technology maturity level of SaaS providers. In other words, securing higher level of SaaS technology maturity is essential for higher business performance. For instance, given that firms implement application uniqueness or a distribution channel diversification as a differentiation strategy, they can acquire more customers when their level of SaaS technology maturity is higher rather than lower. Secondly, results indicate that pursuing differentiation strategy or low cost strategy effectively works for SaaS providers' obtaining customer, which means that continuously differentiating their service from others or making their service fee (subscription fee or initial set-up fee) lower are helpful for their business success in terms of acquiring their customers. Lastly, results show that the level of SaaS technology maturity mediates the relationships between low cost strategy and customer acquisition. That is, based on our research design, customers usually perceive the real value of the low subscription fee or initial set-up fee only through the SaaS service provide by vender and, in turn, this will affect their decision making whether subscribe or not.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.59-69
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• 2010

Green or an environmental consciousness has been a major issue for businesses and government offices, as well as consumers, worldwide. In response to this movement, the Korean government announced, in the early 2000s, the era of "Green Growth" as a way to encourage green-related business activities. The Korean fashion industry, in various levels of involvement, presents diverse eco-friendly products as a part of the green movement. These apparel products include organic products and recycled clothing. For these companies to be successful, they need information about who are the consumers who consider green issues (e.g., environmental sustainability) as part of their personal values when making a decision for product purchase, use, and disposal. These consumers can be considered as eco-sumers. Previous studies have examined consumers' purchase intention for or with eco-friendly products. In addition, studies have examined influential factors used to identify the eco-sumers or green consumers. However, limited attention was paid to eco-sumers' disposal or recycling behavior of clothes in comparison with their green product purchases. Clothing disposal behaviors are ways that consumer can get rid of unused clothing and in clue temporarily lending the item or permanently eliminating the item by "handing down" (e.g., giving it to a younger sibling), donating, exchanging, selling, or simply throwing it away. Accordingly, examining purchasing behaviors of eco-friendly fashion items in conjunction with clothing disposal behaviors should improve understanding of a consumer's clothing consumption behavior from the environmental perspective. The purpose of this exploratory study is to provide descriptive information about Korean eco-sumers who have ecologically-favorable lifestyles and behaviors when buying and disposing of clothes. The objectives of this study are to (a) categorize Koreans on the basis of clothing disposal behaviors; (b) investigate the differences in demographics, lifestyles, and clothing consumption values among segments; and (c) compare the purchase intention of eco-friendly fashion items and influential factors among segments. A self-administered questionnaire was developed based on previous studies. The questionnaire included 10 items of clothing disposal behavior, 22 items of LOHAS (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability) characteristics, and 19 items of consumption values, measured by five-point Likert-type scales. In addition, the purchase intention of two eco-friendly fashion items and 11 attributes of each item were measured by seven-point Likert type scales. Two polyester fleece pullovers, made from fabric created from recycled bottles with the PET identification code, were selected from one Korean brand and one US imported brand among outdoor sportswear brands. A brief description of each product with a color picture was provided in the survey. Demographic variables (i.e., gender, age, marital status, education level, income, occupation) were also included. The data were collected through a professional web survey agency during May 2009. A total of 600 final usable questionnaires were analyzed. The age of respondents ranged from 20 to 49 years old with a mean age of 34 years. Fifty percent of the respondents were males and about 58% were married, and 62% reported having earned university degrees. Principal components factor analysis with varimax rotation was used to identify the underlying dimensions of the clothing disposal behavior scale, and three factors were generated (i.e., reselling behavior, donating behavior, non-recycling behavior). To categorize the respondents on the basis of clothing disposal behaviors, k-mean cluster analysis was used, and three segments were obtained. These consumer segments were labeled as 'Resale Group', 'Donation Group', and 'Non-Recycling Group.' The classification results indicated approximately 98 percent of the original cases were correctly classified. With respect to demographic characteristics among the three segments, significant differences were found in gender, marital status, occupation, and age. LOHAS characteristics were reduced into the following five factors: self-satisfaction, family orientation, health concern, environmental concern, and voluntary service. Significant differences were found in the LOHAS factors among the three clusters. Resale Group and Donation Group showed a similar predisposition to LOHAS issues while the Non-Recycling Group presented the lowest mean scores on the LOHAS factors compared to the other segments. The Resale and Donation Groups described themselves as enjoying or being satisfied with their lives and spending spare-time with family. In addition, these two groups cared about health and organic foods, and tried to conserve energy and resources. Principal components factor analysis generated clothing consumption values into the following three factors: personal values, social value, and practical value. The ANOVA test with the factors showed differences primarily between the Resale Group and the other two groups. The Resale Group was more concerned about personal value and social value than the other segments. In contrast, the Non-Recycling Group presented the higher level of social value than did Donation Group. In a comparison of the intention to purchase eco-friendly products, the Resale Group showed the highest mean score on intent to purchase Product A. On the other hand, the Donation Group presented the highest intention to purchase for Product B among segments. In addition, the mean scores indicated that the Korean product (Product B) was more preferable for purchase than the U.S. product (Product A). Stepwise regression analysis was used to identify the influence of product attributes on the purchase intention of eco product. With respect to Product A, design, price and contribution to environmental preservation were significant to predict purchase intention for the Resale Group, while price and compatibility with my image factors were significant for the Donation Group. For the Non-Recycling Group, design, price compatibility with the factors of my image, participation to eco campaign, and contribution to environmental preservation were significant. Price appropriateness was significant for each of the three clusters. With respect to Product B, design, price and compatibility with my image factors were important, but different attributes were associated significantly with purchase intention for each of the three groups. The influence of LOHAS characteristics and clothing consumption values on intention to purchase Products A and B were also examined. The LOHAS factor of health concern and the personal value factor were significant in the relationships with the purchase intention; however, the explanatory powers were low in the three segments. Findings showed that each group as classified by clothing disposal behaviors showed differences in the attributes of a product, personal values, and the LOHAS characteristics that influenced their purchase intention of eco-friendly products. Findings would enable organizations to understand eco-friendly behavior and to design appropriate strategic decisions to appeal eco-sumers.