• Knowledge Management Research
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.49-72
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• 2016

Extant research on firm innovation productivity is limited in measuring the innovation productivity, in which they measured firm innovation productivity by using either inputs or outputs of innovation. The present study complemented the extant research by employing Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach to measure firm innovation productivity. Furthermore, this paper examined the effects of firms' external knowledge search, as one of open innovation practices, on firm innovation productivity, for open innovation activities are regarded as an influencing factor on firm innovation productivity in the previous literatures. Using the data of the Korean Innovation Survey (KIS) of manufacturing industries conducted in 2008, this study developed hypotheses in which we considered not only two dimensions of external knowledge search (breadth and depth) but also two subtypes of external knowledge search (market-driven and science-driven). The results found that searching deeply and market-driven search are positively related to firm innovation productivity, but science-driven search is somewhat negatively related to firm innovation productivity. Furthermore, market-driven search can mitigate the negative effect of science-driven search on innovation productivity.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.185-198
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• 2020

Purpose - The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of performance-related pay on gender labor productivity differences theoretically and empirically. Design/methodology/approach - This study analyzes the Principal-Agent model in which a firm employes many male and female workers under moral hazard, and uses large survey data from Survey of Business Activities of MDIS (MicroData Integrated Service) in Korea. The fixed-effect model is employed in order to analyze the data. Findings - The theoretical result is that, after performance-related pay is offered to workers, the effect of performance-related pay on gender productivity is determined by whether the female ratio within firm affects firm's performance(such as revenue and profit) per capita. The empirical result is that, before performance-related pay is provided for all workers, the firm's female ratio does not affect firm's revenue and profit per capita at all, but after it is offered, the female ratio positively affects firm's performance per capita. Research implications or Originality - Fixed pay does not bring about the difference between male and female productivity, but performance-related pay affects female productivity more positively than male productivity in Korean firms. It means that female workers are more sensitive to incentives than men in Korea.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.131-140
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• 2019

The study aims to examine the impact of productivity in addition to the policy of increasing the foreign investors' ownership rate on the performance of businesses which were listed on Vietnam's stock exchange market from 2010 to 2017. With the database of 3.961 observations, the study employs a statistical method - multiple regression to estimate the relationship between labor productivity, foreign ownership as well as other firm-level characteristics and firm performance. Research findings show that increasing labor productivity and increasing foreign ownership rates help increase firm performance. In addition, except for financial leverage, variables such as liquidity and firm size have positive effects on firm performance measured by Tobin's Q. These findings have theoretical contributions and practical implications for managers, investors and government in Vietnam. Managers should pay attention to improving labor productivity through employing incentive mechanisms, building a good working environment, investing in technology, etc. in order to enhance the firm performance. Investors could utilize the labor productivity and foreign ownership indicators to select stocks of good companies for investment. For Vietnamese government, relaxing the limit of foreign ownership and accelerating the divesting of State capital in State-owned enterprises could help increase the investment scale of foreign investors and resulting in positive effects on the firm performance.

• Industrial Engineering and Management Systems
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.224-232
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• 2012

The paper proposes a non-parametric methodology, data envelopment analysis, for measuring efficiency and productivity in service delivery systems with capacity constraints. The methodology provides allocation approaches for studying behaviors of firm and customers in service delivery strategy. The experimental study is carried out to investigate allocation behaviors and conduct an objective tradeoff between efficiency approach and productivity approach. The experimental result indicates that the efficiency approach allocates resource via maximizing customer efficiency rather than firm productivity as in the productivity approach. Moreover, the experiment reveals that there exists an objective tradeoff between the efficiency approach and the productivity approach. These findings provide strategic options for allocation policy in service delivery systems.

• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.1-19
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• 2019

Purpose - This research examines the effect of a foreign subsidiary on the productivity growth of a Two-way trading manufacturing firm in Korea. We explore firms engaged in both trade and FDI simultaneously to verify whether participation in GVC as a broad concept is an efficient internationalization strategy to increase the productivity of a Korean manufacturing firm. Design/methodology - Based on the firm-level data by utilizing the Survey of Business Activities from Statistics Korea, we examine the impact of vertically integrated foreign subsidiaries on the productivity of a manufacturing firm that exports and imports simultaneously. Findings - The results show that if a Two-way trading firm establishes one or more overseas subsidiaries, the total factor productivity growth increases. Moreover, the FDI effect is statistically significant when the destination country has an economically close relationship with Korea. However, these effects are disparate depending on the industrial competitiveness or market situation where the subsidiary is located. Nonetheless, the synergy effect resulting from industrial combination is represented in China and the USA only. Originality/value - As the importance of GVC has become more emphasized around the world. In spite of the scarcity of related domestic studies, we explored the effect of multinational manufacturing firms participating in GVC using firm-level data.

• East Asian Economic Review
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.237-252
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• 2020

This paper characterizes the optimal reciprocal trade policy in the environment of Melitz (2003) with firm productivity heterogeneity. In particular, without making parametric assumptions on firm productivity distribution, this paper derives the optimal degree of reciprocal tariff reductions that maximize the world welfare. A reciprocal import subsidy raises the industry productivity, lowering aggregate price; a reciprocal import tariff helps correct the markup distortion, increasing nominal income. With all the conflicting effects of import tariffs on welfare considered, the optimal degree of reciprocity in multilateral tariff reduction is shown to be free trade.

• International Area Studies Review
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.41-60
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• 2018

It is widely known that the increased productivity lead to a decrease in energy consumption. The policy for reducing energy consumption is also focusing on the improvement of firm's productivity. However, the issue of productivity dilemma phenomenon is recently raised in various fields. It is phenomenon that the increased productivity rather lead to a increased in energy consumption through a rise in output. This paper analyzed the presence of productivity dilemma in korean firm using Tang et al(2015)'s theoretical model. To closely analyze, I performed the analysis using 715 firms during 2011-2015 and estimated the model using system GMM to minimize the endogeneity. The results show that total effect of productivity had a significantly negative coefficient. It is implies that the increased productivity doesn't increase energy consumption. In other word, this paper could not identified productivity dilemma and so did in overseas investment firm and national firm cases.

• East Asian Economic Review
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.257-277
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• 2022

Does servitization improve manufacturing firms' performance, and in what condition? Following the seminal work of Crozet and Milet (2017), this study analyzes disaggregated firm-level data that covers 40,000 South Korean manufacturing firms surveyed by the Survey of Business Activities of Korea. We compute firm-level servitization intensity with available sales data of each firm by two-digit SIC sub-sectors. We find two novel empirical regularities: Korean servitization intensity distribution shows a very different shape from the French benchmark; Servitized firms tend to perform higher profitability and higher productivity than non-servitized firms.

• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.102-116
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• 2022

Purpose - This paper empirically investigates the relationship between firm productivity and importing intermediate inputs in the Korean manufacturing sector. Design/methodology - This paper tests the two related hypotheses on the relationship between importing and productivity for a sample of Korean manufacturing firms. We test the self-selection hypothesis by comparing pre-entry levels of productivity between importers and non-importers. We test the learning-by-importing hypothesis by employing propensity score matching with differencein-differences approach. Findings - Future importers are more productive than future non-importers years before they start to import, which supports the self-selection hypothesis. In contrast, there is no strong evidence for learning-by-importing. Originality/value - This paper is the first study to explore the relationship between importing and firm-level productivity for Korean firms. The results have an important implication on trade policies to lower or raise trade barriers in imported inputs.

• Journal of Korea Technology Innovation Society
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.1077-1100
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• 2018

The present study analyzed the effect of firms' external research and development (R&D) on corporate productivity, while investigating the moderating effect of firm size on the external R&D-productivity nexus. In the empirical analysis, we estimated South Korean manufacturing firms' total factor productivity (TFP) using the firm level data drawn from the Survey of Business Activities (Korea National Statistical Office) for the years 2006-2015. Thereafter, focusing on the role of external R&D and its interaction with the firm size in determining firms' TFP, the productivity function was estimated as well. To this end, we used ordinary least squares (OLS) and quantile regression to highlight the heterogeneous impacts of external R&D by companies' productivity level. Empirical results confirmed that firms' external R&D significantly enhanced corporate productivity in all manufacturing industries, from high-tech to low-tech. The moderating effect of firm size in determining the productivity effect of external R&D was not as prominent as in the case for internal R&D, which exhibited some degree of the size premium in the productivity-enhancing effect. These results suggest that regardless of the firm size, external R&D can be an important channel for corporate productivity improvement, and can be a particularly effective strategy for SMEs with relatively limited internal R&D capacities.