• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.51-69
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• 2020

Now, it is a stylized fact that a small number of technology firms such as Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook and a few others have become larger and dominant players in an industry. Coupled with the rise of these leading firms, we have also observed that a large number of young firms have become an acquisition target in their early IPO stages. This indeed results in a sharp decline in the number of new entries in public exchanges although a series of policy reforms have been promulgated to foster competition through an increase in new entries. Given the observed industry trend in recent decades, a number of studies have reported increased concentration in most developed countries. However, it is less understood as to what caused an increase in industry concentration. In this paper, we uncover the mechanisms by which industries have become concentrated over the last decades by tracing the changes in industry concentration associated with a firm's status change in its early IPO stages. To this end, we put emphasis on the case in which firms are acquired shortly after they went public. Especially, with the transition to digital-based economies, it is imperative for incumbent firms to adapt and keep pace with new ICT and related intelligent systems. For instance, after the acquisition of a young firm equipped with AI-based solutions, an incumbent firm may better respond to a change in customer taste and preference by integrating acquired AI solutions and analytics skills into multiple business processes. Accordingly, it is not unusual for young ICT firms become an attractive acquisition target. To examine the role of M&As involved with young firms in reshaping the level of industry concentration, we identify a firm's status in early post-IPO stages over the sample periods spanning from 1990 to 2016 as follows: i) being delisted, ii) being standalone firms and iii) being acquired. According to our analysis, firms that have conducted IPO since 2000s have been acquired by incumbent firms at a relatively quicker time than those that did IPO in previous generations. We also show a greater acquisition rate for IPO firms in the ICT sector compared with their counterparts in other sectors. Our results based on multinomial logit models suggest that a large number of IPO firms have been acquired in their early post-IPO lives despite their financial soundness. Specifically, we show that IPO firms are likely to be acquired rather than be delisted due to financial distress in early IPO stages when they are more profitable, more mature or less leveraged. For those IPO firms with venture capital backup have also become an acquisition target more frequently. As a larger number of firms are acquired shortly after their IPO, our results show increased concentration. While providing limited evidence on the impact of large incumbent firms in explaining the change in industry concentration, our results show that the large firms' effect on industry concentration are pronounced in the ICT sector. This result possibly captures the current trend that a few tech giants such as Alphabet, Apple and Facebook continue to increase their market share. In addition, compared with the acquisitions of non-ICT firms, the concentration impact of IPO firms in early stages becomes larger when ICT firms are acquired as a target. Our study makes new contributions. To our best knowledge, this is one of a few studies that link a firm's post-IPO status to associated changes in industry concentration. Although some studies have addressed concentration issues, their primary focus was on market power or proprietary software. Contrast to earlier studies, we are able to uncover the mechanism by which industries have become concentrated by placing emphasis on M&As involving young IPO firms. Interestingly, the concentration impact of IPO firm acquisitions are magnified when a large incumbent firms are involved as an acquirer. This leads us to infer the underlying reasons as to why industries have become more concentrated with a favor of large firms in recent decades. Overall, our study sheds new light on the literature by providing a plausible explanation as to why industries have become concentrated.

• Journal of Service Research and Studies
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.114-129
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• 2023

In the era of the 4th industrial revolution, the importance of the 4th industrial revolution technology is increasing in the service industry. The purpose of this study is to identify the development and utilization status of the 4th industrial revolution technology in the service industry and to derive the characteristics and implications of the 4th industrial revolution technology innovation in the service industry. In this study, research and analysis were conducted based on the business activity survey data in order to identify the technological innovation characteristics of the 4th industrial revolution in the service industry. The 4th industrial revolution technology in the service industry was analyzed in terms of company ratio, technology development and utilization rate, development/utilization technology, technology application field, and technology development method. In addition, the trend of the 4th industrial revolution technology change in the service industry was also analyzed. The 4th industrial revolution technology utilization and development status of other industries was compared and analyzed. In particular, the service industry 4th industrial revolution technology innovation type was divided into 4 types from the perspective of the 4th industrial revolution company ratio and the 4th industrial revolution company ratio growth rate, and types for each service industry were derived. The characteristics and implications of the 4th industrial revolution technology innovation in the service industry were presented from nine perspectives. As a result of the study, it was found that companies in the service industry were developing or using 4th industrial revolution technologies more actively than companies in other industries, and it was analyzed that the gap was further widening. By service industry, information and communication, finance and insurance, and educational service showed relatively high rates of developing or utilizing 4th industrial revolution technologies. The service industries in which the share of 4th industrial revolution companies increased the most were real estate, education service, health and social welfare service. In particular, cloud, big data, and artificial intelligence were analyzed as the three core technologies of the fourth industrial revolution. The service industry can be classified into 4 types in terms of the 4th industrial revolution company ratio and growth rate, and service industry innovation measures that reflect the differentiated innovation characteristics of each type are needed.

• Information Systems Review
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.99-123
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• 2019

The software industry is a high value-added industry in the knowledge information age, and its importance is growing as it not only plays a key role in knowledge creation and utilization, but also secures global competitiveness. Among various SW available in today's business environment, Open Source Software(OSS) is rapidly expanding its activity area by not only leading software development, but also integrating with new information technology. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to empirically examine and analyze the effect of factors on the switching behavior to OSS. To accomplish the study's purpose, we suggest the research model based on "Push-Pull-Mooring" framework. This study empirically examines the two categories of antecedents for switching behavior toward OSS. The survey was conducted to employees at various firms that already switched OSS. A total of 268 responses were collected and analyzed by using the structural equational modeling. The results of this study are as follows; first, continuous maintenance cost, vender dependency, functional indifference, and SW resource inefficiency are significantly related to switch to OSS. Second, network-oriented support, testability and strategic flexibility are significantly related to switch to OSS. Finally, the results show that willingness to secures SW competitiveness has a moderating effect on the relationships between push factors and pull factor with exception of improved knowledge, and switch to OSS. The results of this study will contribute to fields related to OSS both theoretically and practically.

• The Mathematical Education
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• v.62 no.3
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• pp.381-400
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• 2023

As the era of solving various and complex problems in the real world using artificial intelligence and big data appears, problem-solving competencies that can solve realistic problems through a mathematical approach are required. In fact, the 2015 revised mathematics curriculum and the 2022 revised mathematics curriculum emphasize mathematical modeling as an activity and competency to solve real-world problems. However, the real-world problems presented in domestic and international textbooks have a high proportion of artificial problems that rarely occur in real-world. Accordingly, domestic and international countries are paying attention to the reality of mathematical modeling tasks and suggesting the need for authentic tasks that reflect students' daily lives. However, not only did previous studies focus on theoretical proposals for reality, but studies analyzing teachers' perceptions of reality and their competency to reflect reality in the task are insufficient. Accordingly, this study aims to analyze in-service mathematics teachers' perception of reality among the characteristics of tasks for mathematical modeling and the in-service mathematics teachers' competency for designing the mathematical modeling tasks. First of all, five criteria for satisfying the reality were established by analyzing literatures. Afterward, teacher training was conducted under the theme of mathematical modeling. Pre- and post-surveys for 41 in-service mathematics teachers who participated in the teacher training was conducted to confirm changes in perception of reality. The pre- and post- surveys provided a task that did not reflect reality, and in-service mathematics teachers determined whether the task given in surveys reflected reality and selected one reason for the judgment among five criteria for reality. Afterwards, frequency analysis was conducted by coding the results of the survey answered by in-service mathematics teachers in the pre- and post- survey, and frequencies were compared to confirm in-service mathematics teachers' perception changes on reality. In addition, the mathematical modeling tasks designed by in-service teachers were evaluated with the criteria for reality to confirm the teachers' competency for designing mathematical modeling tasks reflecting the reality. As a result, it was shown that in-service mathematics teachers changed from insufficient perception that only considers fragmentary criterion for reality to perceptions that consider all the five criteria of reality. In particular, as a result of analyzing the basis for judgment among in-service mathematics teachers whose judgment on reality was reversed in the pre- and post-survey, changes in the perception of in-service mathematics teachers was confirmed, who did not consider certain criteria as a criterion for reality in the pre-survey, but considered them as a criterion for reality in the post-survey. In addition, as a result of evaluating the tasks designed by in-service mathematics teachers for mathematical modeling, in-service mathematics teachers showed the competency to reflect reality in their tasks. However, among the five criteria for reality, the criterion for "situations that can occur in students' daily lives," "need to solve the task," and "require conclusions in a real-world situation" were relatively less reflected. In addition, it was found that the proportion of teachers with low task development competencies was higher in the teacher group who could not make the right judgment than in the teacher group who could make the right judgment on the reality of the task. Based on the results of these studies, this study provides implications for teacher education to enable mathematics teachers to apply mathematical modeling lesson in their classes.