In this study, we investigate the effects of technology innovation investments and employment on credit ratings of very small start-up businesses using the data period of 2009 till 2015 test two hypotheses: asymmetric information hypothesis or competence hypothesis. We use financial and non-financial data of 51,903 observations of 12,028 small businesses from a database of a commercial bank and fixed effects panel models and two-stage instrumental variable models. We find that in the short-run small size startups show lower credit ratings than non-startups, and that both technology innovation activities and employment capability improve their credit ratings. In the long-run, technology innovation investments do not improve their credit ratings of later years while employment capability improve their credit ratings of the subsequent year. In addition, the age of startups improves their credit ratings of the current year and until the subsequent two years while employee productivity, fixed ratio and ROA positively affect their credit ratings for up to three years. However, short-term and overall debt ratios, cost of borrowings and firm-size negatively affect their credit ratings for up to three years. The results of the study on credit ratings suggest that credit rating agencies seem to consider both technology innovation activities and employment capability in the credit ratings of small start-ups as 'competence factors' rather than 'asymmetric information factors' with inefficiency and cost burdens. The results also suggest that we must find ways to reflect properly the severe asymmetric information of the early-stage start-ups, and technology innovation activities and employment capability in the credit rating formula.
Corner block with anchor bolt(CBA) joint method used in knock-down type table furniture manufacturing can reduce the packing and transporting cost. Unfortunately. it also has the disastrous defect to be loosend and unstable during the service life mainly due to fatigue and creep(repeated and prolonged loading). So 22 joint groups constructed were tested to evaluate the effect of some design factors related to the size of side rail(apron). block attachment to side rail. and the number of anchor bolt as well as the effect of the type of corner block(mitered type vs. rectangular type) Usable strength from the stiffness coefficients of each joint group were analysed with SPSS /PC+ and described as the criteria of CBA joint construction. The conclusions were as follows: The height of side rail(50, 75 and 100 mm) and the addition of polyvinyl acetate(PVAc) emulsion in the corner block attactment to side rail had the effect on raising the usable strength of CBA joint with remarkable high significance. And the effect of 2 - anchor bolts was also superior to that of 1 - bolt significantly. However. the thickness of side rail(22 mm vs. 25 mm) had no effect on the strengthening the table joint rigidity. Mitered type corner block joint appeared to he recommendable for CBA jointed table construction rather than the rectangular type one regardless of the method of block attachment to side rail. The best result identified from Duncan's multiple comparison was in the construction with 25 mm thick and 100 mm height of side rail fastened using 2 - anchor bolts in mitered type corner block. But it would be reasonable to use 22 mm thick & 75 mm high side rail and mitered corner block with PVAc emulsion & 2 bolts considering the productivity and production cost down in the MDF furniture manufacturing industries.
There are many factors affecting the development of sericultural industry in Korea. The setting of a rational pricing system for sericultural products is one of important activities of the Korean Government to improve the incentives to producers. The determination o： the prices for many years were based on the production costs including a certain level of profits. Some of cost items are in conflict both in cocoon producers and silk-reeling industries. Government officials have to evaluate these conflicting problems and estimate the consequences of their decisions. In this situation the final decision often became political decisions. This analysis is aimed at providing an alternative method of setting the prices of sericultural products. The criteria of the equilibrium employed in this analysis are based on economic principle which equilibrium condition is determined by the relationships between the marginal productivity of input factors and factor prices. In order to obtain the related information Cobb-Douglas'functions were fitted using KIST computer and data were obtained mostly from the Bank of Korea and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestru, An important assumption is that "Opportunity Costs" of factors input in both cocoon production and silk-Peeling industries are same, The major finding s obtained are as followings. 1) The sum of coefficient of production elastisity in silk-reeling industries is greater than one. Silk-reeling industries are operating under the situation of increasing return to scale and it is, therefore, expected to develop the industries as the capital-intensive large scale. 2) The cocoon producing farmers are under the situations of the decreasing return to scale and it is expected to continue their cocoon farming as the labor-intensive small scale, assuming the present level of production technology. As the development of commercial farming, the resources input in cocoon production will be shifted to the production for higher profitable crops, 3) The price elastisity of production is higher in cocoon production than in silk-reeling industries. It is expected that the price changing effects on domestic production will be resulted from cocoon producers. 4) Based on analysis results of marginal productivities and the opportunity costs of resources, cocoon price for meeting equilibrium price condition is to be increased by 8-16 percent or standard price level of silk increased by 6-8 percent. There were the possibilities of over evaluation on opportunity cost of resources input in silk-reeling industries, or income transfered from the farmers to the industries. It is recommended that the prices for meeting equilibrium price conditions are to be determined by 72 percent for cocoon and 28 percent for silk-reeling costs, based on standard level of the exporting prices.
The purpose of this research is to construct research framework for international franchising based on existing literature and to identify research components in the framework. Franchise can be defined as management styles that allow franchisee use various management assets of franchisor in order to make or sell product or service. It can be divided into product distribution franchise that is designed to sell products and business format franchise that is designed for running it as business whatever its form is. International franchising can be defined as a way of internationalization of franchisor to foreign country by providing its business format or package to franchisee of host country. International franchising is growing fast for last four decades but academic research on this is quite limited. Especially in Korea, research about international franchising is carried out on by case study format with single case or empirical study format with survey based on domestic franchise theory. Therefore, this paper tries to review existing literature on international franchising research, providing research framework, and then stimulating new research on this field. International franchising research components include motives and environmental factors for decision of expanding to international franchising, entrance modes and development plan for international franchising, contracts and management strategy of international franchising, and various performance measures from different perspectives. First, motives of international franchising are fee collection from franchisee. Also it provides easier way to expanding to foreign country. The other motives including increase total sales volume, occupying better strategic position, getting quality resources, and improving efficiency. Environmental factors that facilitating international franchising encompasses economic condition, trend, and legal or political factors in host and/or home countries. In addition, control power and risk management capability of franchisor plays critical role in successful franchising contract. Final decision to enter foreign country via franchising is determined by numerous factors like history, size, growth, competitiveness, management system, bonding capability, industry characteristics of franchisor. After deciding to enter into foreign country, franchisor needs to set entrance modes of international franchising. Within contractual mode, there are master franchising and area developing franchising, licensing, direct franchising, and joint venture. Theories about entrance mode selection contain concepts of efficiency, knowledge-based approach, competence-based approach, agent theory, and governance cost. The next step after entrance decision is operation strategy. Operation strategy starts with selecting a target city and a target country for franchising. In order to finding, screening targets, franchisor needs to collect information about candidates. Critical information includes brand patent, commercial laws, regulations, market conditions, country risk, and industry analysis. After selecting a target city in target country, franchisor needs to select franchisee, in other word, partner. The first important criteria for selecting partners are financial credibility and capability, possession of real estate. And cultural similarity and knowledge about franchisor and/or home country are also recognized as critical criteria. The most important element in operating strategy is legal document between franchisor and franchisee with home and host countries. Terms and conditions in legal documents give objective information about characteristics of franchising agreement for academic research. Legal documents have definitions of terminology, territory and exclusivity, agreement of term, initial fee, continuing fees, clearing currency, and rights about sub-franchising. Also, legal documents could have terms about softer elements like training program and operation manual. And harder elements like law competent court and terms of expiration. Next element in operating strategy is about product and service. Especially for business format franchising, product/service deliverable, benefit communicators, system identifiers (architectural features), and format facilitators are listed for product/service strategic elements. Another important decision on product/service is standardization vs. customization. The rationale behind standardization is cost reduction, efficiency, consistency, image congruence, brand awareness, and competitiveness on price. Also standardization enables large scale R&D and innovative change in management style. Another element in operating strategy is control management. The simple way to control franchise contract is relying on legal terms, contractual control system. There are other control systems, administrative control system and ethical control system. Contractual control system is a coercive source of power, but franchisor usually doesn't want to use legal power since it doesn't help to build up positive relationship. Instead, self-regulation is widely used. Administrative control system uses control mechanism from ordinary work relationship. Its main component is supporting activities to franchisee and communication method. For example, franchisor provides advertising, training, manual, and delivery, then franchisee follows franchisor's direction. Another component is building franchisor's brand power. The last research element is performance factor of international franchising. Performance elements can be divided into franchisor's performance and franchisee's performance. The conceptual performance measures of franchisor are simple but not easy to obtain objectively. They are profit, sale, cost, experience, and brand power. The performance measures of franchisee are mostly about benefits of host country. They contain small business development, promotion of employment, introduction of new business model, and level up technology status. There are indirect benefits, like increase of tax, refinement of corporate citizenship, regional economic clustering, and improvement of international balance. In addition to those, host country gets socio-cultural change other than economic effects. It includes demographic change, social trend, customer value change, social communication, and social globalization. Sometimes it is called as westernization or McDonaldization of society. In addition, the paper reviews on theories that have been frequently applied to international franchising research, such as agent theory, resource-based view, transaction cost theory, organizational learning theory, and international expansion theories. Resource based theory is used in strategic decision based on resources, like decision about entrance and cooperation depending on resources of franchisee and franchisor. Transaction cost theory can be applied in determination of mutual trust or satisfaction of franchising players. Agent theory tries to explain strategic decision for reducing problem caused by utilizing agent, for example research on control system in franchising agreements. Organizational Learning theory is relatively new in franchising research. It assumes organization tries to maximize performance and learning of organization. In addition, Internalization theory advocates strategic decision of direct investment for removing inefficiency of market transaction and is applied in research on terms of contract. And oligopolistic competition theory is used to explain various entry modes for international expansion. Competency theory support strategic decision of utilizing key competitive advantage. Furthermore, research methodologies including qualitative and quantitative methodologies are suggested for more rigorous international franchising research. Quantitative research needs more real data other than survey data which is usually respondent's judgment. In order to verify theory more rigorously, research based on real data is essential. However, real quantitative data is quite hard to get. The qualitative research other than single case study is also highly recommended. Since international franchising has limited number of applications, scientific research based on grounded theory and ethnography study can be used. Scientific case study is differentiated with single case study on its data collection method and analysis method. The key concept is triangulation in measurement, logical coding and comparison. Finally, it provides overall research direction for international franchising after summarizing research trend in Korea. International franchising research in Korea has two different types, one is for studying Korean franchisor going overseas and the other is for Korean franchisee of foreign franchisor. Among research on Korean franchisor, two common patterns are observed. First of all, they usually deal with success story of one franchisor. The other common pattern is that they focus on same industry and country. Therefore, international franchise research needs to extend their focus to broader subjects with scientific research methodology as well as development of new theory.
Recently, a closed-type plant factory has been receiving attention as a advanced agricultural method. It has diverse advantages such as climate-independence, high productivity and stable year-round production. However, high energy cost caused by environmental control system is considered as a challenges of a closed-type plant factory. In order to reduce the energy cost, investigation about energy load which is directly connected to energy consumption needs to be conducted. In this study, energy load changes of a plant factory have been analytically analyzed according to the environmental changes. The target plant factory was a lettuce growing container farm. Firstly, the impact of photoperiod, set temperature and relative humidity change were examined. Under the climate condition of Daejeon in South Korea, increase of photoperiod and set temperature rose a yearly energy demand of a container farm. However, increase of set relative humidity decreased a yearly energy demand. Secondly, the climate environment effect was compared by investigating the energy demand under 9 different climate conditions. As a result, the difference between maximum and minimum value of the yearly energy demand showed 21.7%. Lastly, sensitivity analysis of each parameter (photoperiod, set temperature and relative humidity) has been suggested under 3 different climate conditions. The ratio of heating and cooling demand was varied depending on the climate, so the effect of each parameter became different.
Agriculture is a primary industry that influenced by the weather or meterological factors more than other industry. Global warming and worldwide climate changes, and unusual weather phenomena are fatal in agricultural industry and human life. Therefore, many previous studies have been made to find the relationship between weather and the productivity of agriculture. Meterological factors also influence on the distribution of agricultural product. For example, price of agricultural product is determined in the market, and also influenced by the weather of the market. However, there is only a few study was made to find this link. The objective of this study is to investigate the effects of meterological factors on the distribution of agricultural products, focusing on the distribution of chinese cabbages. Chinese cabbage is a main ingredient of Kimchi, and basic essential vegetable in Korean dinner table. However, the production of chinese cabbages is influenced by weather and very fluctuating so that the variation of its price is so unstable. Therefore, both consumers and farmers do not feel comfortable at the unstable price of chinese cabbages. In this study, we analyze the real transaction data of chinese cabbage in wholesale markets and meterological factors depending on the variety and geography. We collect and analyze data of meterological factors such as temperatures, humidity, cloudiness, rainfall, snowfall, wind speed, insolation, sunshine duration in producing and consuming region of chinese cabbages. The result of this study shows that the meterological factors such as temperature and humidity significantly influence on the volume and price of chinese cabbage transaction in wholesale market. Especially, the weather of consuming region has greater correlation effects on transaction than that of producing region in all types of chinese cabbages. Among the whole agricultural lifecycle of chinese cabbages, 'seeding - harvest - shipment - wholesale', meterological factors such as temperature and rainfall in shipment and wholesale period are significantly correlated with transaction volume and price of crops. Based on the result of correlation analysis, we make a regression analysis to verify the meterological factors' effects on the volume and price of chines cabbage transaction in wholesale market. The results of stepwise regression analysis are shown in