• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.26 no.7
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• pp.958-969
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• 2002

No one doubts that textile and apparel industries have contributed to economic miracles of the export-led growth in Korea. However, by the turning of 1990′s, these sectors have encountered many problems such as decreasing of domestic production and exports mainly due to wage rise and shortage. Therefore, foreign direct investment to the low labor cost countries has been enlarged for a way of improving its competitiveness and increasing exports. However, no intensive study has been made exploring current investments and future directions. This study focuses Vietnam as one of the promising overseas investment countries. The purposes of this study are to analyze current investment status of Korean textiles and apparel firms in Vietnam, to explore merits and problems Vietnam has, and to present useful implications and strategies for Korean textiles and apparel companies. Analysis of current secondary data suggests that Korean apparel industry, rather than textiles industry, have invested more in Vietnam, mostly in southern Ho Chi Minh City. Investments of Korean apparel and textile firms have shown steady increase from 1990 but have turned to a decrease from 1995. Findings suggested that Vietnam has merits for attracting foreign investment since it provides relatively cheap labor and outstanding skillful hands suitable for apparel and textiles industries. In addition, because of EU quota increase and the trade agreement between Vietnam and USA it is likely for firms in Vietnam to increase exports to EU and USA Rapid expansion of domestic apparel market and "Korean trend (Han Rue)" in Vietnam resulted from successful star marketing of Korean firms are another merits Vietnam has to the Korean fm. However, regulations of central government, low efficiency of bureaucratic and stiff administrative process, difficulty of making decision in case of joint venture, lack of social overhead capital, high factory construction costs, weak construction condition, and the excessive competition among investment enterprises have found to be problems. Based on pros and cons of investment to Vietnam, marketing strategies, practical implications and future directions were suggested.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.58-74
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• 2011

This study analyzed and compared the importance and priority of location decision factors in Foreign Direct Investment Firms managing the manufacturing business in the nation's southeastern economic zone, and in expert group by using AHP analytical technique based on examining the location theory and the prior research of real estate for industry. Also, it analyzed difference in importance and priority for location factors by corporate scale, by business category, and by location type targeting only foreign direct investment firms, and offered references necessary for location decision-making. In addition, to elicit useful information for policy related to location decision factors for foreign direct investment firms, the implications were elicited by analyzing the results recognized between foreign direct investment firms and expert group on information elements regarding investment satisfaction, business bottlenecks, and location decision process. The considerable gap was indicated in importance and priority of location decision factors considered between the nation's foreign direct investment firms and real-estate expert group for industry. As a result of analyzing by reflecting the corporate characteristic variable in location assessment model unlike before, the importance of the competitive advantage factor and the business strategic factor was indicated to be very high.

• Proceedings of the Korean Operations and Management Science Society Conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.1784-1787
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• 2006

In the risk capital market there are various types of investors competing each other. In the past, venture capital firms depended on government subsidies to stay in business. In order to be survived in today's competitive market, they need to have had the necessary knowledge and organizational resources to build their own competitive advantages. We examine the relationship between organizational characteristics, human resources, and investment strategies of venture capital firms in Korea.

• East Asian Economic Review
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.353-379
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• 2019

This paper aims to determine factors causing the stagnation of Korean firms' fixed investment after the global financial crisis, using panel data for the period of 1999-2016. Fixed investment remained sensitive to cash flow and Tobin's q although their effects decreased after the global financial crisis. A decreasing trend of cash flow and an increase in Tobin's q since the early 2000's imply that the worsening cash flow was a major factor behind the sluggish investment after the crisis. Meanwhile, debt-equity ratio remained significant for non-chaebol affiliated firms, reflecting disparity in access to external financing. Volatility of stock returns also became insignificant after the crisis, casting doubt on the argument that uncertainty was a major factor contributing to the decline of fixed investment. Analysis of financial investment confirmed the significant effect of cash flow, larger than that on financial investment than on fixed investment. In particular, debt repayment and other financial investment, except share repurchase, were sensitive to cash flow. However, the substitution of fixed investment by financial investment is a consequence, rather than a cause of declining fixed investment.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.97-106
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• 2015

Background & Methods: The purpose of this research is to estimate the efficiency of the pharmaceutical firms and the determinants of their efficiency. Stochastic frontier analysis(SFA) and panel study are applied to the data of 60 domestic pharmaceutical firms from 2006 to 2012. Results & Conclusion: First, the result of the stochastic frontier analysis shows that overall efficiency of the pharmaceutical firms is increasing as time goes by. However, if firms are classified by the scale, the larger firms show more efficiency and if classified by the degree of innovativeness, the innovative firms show more efficiency compared to the non-innovative firms. This evidences show that the scale and R&D investment have significant relationships with the efficiency of the pharmaceutical firms. Therefore, it is necessary to increase the national level of investment for the fundamental researches to vitalize R&D of the new drugs. Second, the result of estimation of the determinants of efficiency shows that the firms with larger sales promotion expenses and entertainment expenses have less efficiency compared to the other firms. This can be explained by the structural characteristics of the small generic pharmaceutical firms. Therefore, the government had better make the pharmaceutical firms to reduce sales promotion and entertainment expenses and increase R&D expenses by introducing systems such as global budgeting system on medicine or reference pricing system.

• Korean Business Review
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• v.9
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• pp.99-121
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• 1996

On the job training is useful : a part of on the job training has increased the marginal productivity of future and rate of wage. Investment in a human capital depends on character of investment and market conditions. The innovation role of small and medium firms has recently received increasing attention in newly industrializing countries as they attempt to transform their industries from labor intensive to technology intensive. It also suggests some implications to the small and medium firms' strategies and public policies accelerating research and development. Lack of qualified scientists and engineers often inhibits the small and medium firms' ability to access and assimilate external technical information. Such technical personnel are particularly scarce in NICs. Therefore, how to employ these technical staff should be an important issue for small and medium firms seeking to acquire distinctive competences. Small and medium firms must invest further education and training to its labor.

• Journal of the Korean Operations Research and Management Science Society
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.19-43
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• 2004

This study was motivated by a practical need for estimating the macroeconomic effect of government IT Promotion investment, specifically for micro and small firms. Small firms have been in a disadvantageous position to adopt and utilize new IT compared with medium or large-sized firms. Small firms don't have enough resource to acquire IT in general, therefore private IT companies don't have much incentive to develop IT services and products for small firms. Lack of feasible IT solutions for small firms again restricted active IT adoption of small firms. Government recognized the vicious cycle, therefore decided to promote private IT companies to develop IT services and products for small firms's. Our main concern was to identify a relevant government supporting Policy, especially in the amount and the period. To do this, we first constructed a system dynamics simulation model to Investigate important factors and causal relationships among them. Simulation results showed 2.19% of GDP contribution and 0.16% of employment contribution in max from small firms' IT adoption. Also we could find that investing proper amount for a short period would be for better than maintaining Investing small amount for a long period.

• Korea Trade Review
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• v.42 no.1
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• pp.165-188
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• 2017

Foreign direct investment is the means for companies to enter the overseas market and strengthen their competitiveness. The holding of intellectual properties, representing advantages of firms, may affect foreign direct investment. By expanding previous studies, we define intellectual properties as including trademarks and design as well as patents. Using a random-effect panel data model, we examine the effects of both intellectual properties of Korea and host countries on Korea's foreign direct investment in 128 countries from 1981 to 2014. The results are as follow. First, the coefficients of Korea's intellectual properties, patent, trademark, and design are significantly positive. This implies that Korean firms may invest abroad to take their advantages of technologies, brand value, and the capability of product differentiation. Second, except for patents, intellectual properties of host countries have a positive impact on foreign direct investment. In other words, foreign direct investment to acquire the ability of branding or product design from host countries may occur. Third, the coefficients of Korea's intellectual properties are significantly greater than those of host countries' properties. Foreign direct investment to take advantages of the firms' capabilities overseas is greater than one to acquire knowledge of host countries. Finally, Korea's intellectual properties have a greater positive impact on foreign direct investment in high growth countries than in low growth countries. It is interpreted that Korean firms are more motivated to exploit their intellectual properties in developing countries with a high growth than developed countries. Overall, it is confirmed that Korea's foreign direct investment not only to utilize some advantages but also to seek the brand value or product differentiation ability from host countries can occur. Our findings provide the contribution that some innovative activities in firms and R&D investments policies which encourage the possession of intellectual properties can improve foreign direct investment.

• Management & Information Systems Review
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• v.37 no.2
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• pp.259-281
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• 2018

Advocates of mandatory IFRS adoption claim that IFRS increase financial statement comparability, which in turn leads to greater cross-border investment(Securities and Exchange Commision, 2008). The notion is that improved financial statement comparability reduces the information acquisition costs of global investors and thereby increase their investment in foreign firms. The purpose of this study is to examine this assertion by examining whether the K-IFRS adoption rusults in improved comparability that leads to increased investment by foreign investment. We also examined whether the relation between comparability and foreign investment has strengthen after adoption of K-IFRS. To achieve the purpose of our study, we measure Korean firms comparability using stock price model, stock return model and cash flow from operation model by Barth et al.(2012). We use both foreign ownership in the end of year and average during the year for dependent variables were to reduce bias. We test our hypothesis using 1,817 firm-year observation of KOSPI firms during the period of our analysis, 2011-2015. Consistent with our hypothesis, we find K-IFRS adoption results in a greater increase in foreign investment in firms with high comparability firms. This result indicate that the adoption of K-IFRS intends to achieve the international accounting convergence as stated in the roadmap and to reduce the Korea Discount.

• International Area Studies Review
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.43-63
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• 2013

This paper investigates the impact of free trade agreement (FTA) on the performance of Korea's foreign direct investment (FDI) firms. We use plant- and firm-level data to examine the trends of FDI patterns of Korean firms between 2002 and 2010 by dividing firms based on their sizes - large and small firms. Analyzing firms' FDI activities worldwide, we find that small firms account for large share of investment cases especially in countries where FTA became effective with Korea during our sample period. Using these facts, we estimate the changes of productivity and performance of large and small firms and their foreign affiliates before and after FTA became effective. Our results show that FTA increases productivity of small firms and their foreign affiliates after its formation. In particular, we provide evidence that productivity improvement by small firms and their foreign affiliates may result from an increase in production and capital during FTA period.