Analysis of Traffic Safety Effectiveness of Vehicle Seat-belt Wearing Detection System (주행차량 안전벨트 착용 검지시스템 교통안전 효과 분석)
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- The Journal of The Korea Institute of Intelligent Transport Systems
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- v.22 no.5
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- pp.53-73
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- 2023
Although it is mandatory to wear a seat belt that can minimize human injury when traffic accident occurs, the number of traffic accident casualties not wearing seat belts still accounts for a significant proportion.The seat belt wearing detection system for all seats is a system that identifies whether all seat passengers wear a seat belt and encourages their usage, also it can be a useful technical countermeasure. Firstly, this study established the viability of system implementation by assessing the factors influencing the severity of injuries in traffic accidents through the development of an ordered probit model. Analysis results showed that the use of seat belts has statistically significant effects on the severity of traffic accidents, reducing the probability of death or serious injury by 0.054 times in the event of a traffic accident. Secondly, a meta-analysis was conducted based on prior research related to seat belts and injuries in traffic accidents to estimate the expected reduction in accident severity upon the implementation of the system.The analysis of the effect of accident severity reduction revealed that wearing seat belts would lead to a 63.3% decrease in fatal accidents, with the front seats showing a reduction of 75.7% and the rear seats showing a reduction of 58.1% in fatal accidents. Lastly, Using the results of the meta-analysis and traffic accident statistics, the expected decrease in the number of traffic accident casualties with the implementation of the system was derived to analyze the traffic safety effects of the proposed detection system. The analysis demonstrated that with an increase in the adoption rate of the system, the number of casualties in accidents where seat belts were not worn decreased. Specifically, at a system adoption rate of 60%, it is anticipated that the number of fatalities would decrease by more than three times compared to the current scenario. Based on the analysis results, operational strategies for the system were proposed to increase seat belt usage rates and reduce accident severity.
This study aimed to develop a competency evaluation scale tailored to the specific needs of key talent in the ICT startup sector. Existing competency assessment tools are mostly designed for environments in large corporations or traditional small and medium-sized enterprises, failing to adequately reflect the dynamic requirements of rapidly evolving startups. For startups, where a small number of individuals directly impact company success, key talent is a critical asset. Accordingly, this study sought to create a scale that measures the competencies suited to the challenges and opportunities faced by startups, helping domestic startups establish more effective talent management strategies. The research initially selected 71 items through a literature review and in-depth interviews. Based on expert feedback that emphasized the need for more precise and clear descriptions, the item descriptions were revised, and a total of 65 items were developed through four rounds of content validation. Following preliminary and main surveys, a final set of 58 items was developed. The main survey conducted further factor analysis based on the three broad competency factors?knowledge, skills, and attitude?identified in the preliminary survey. As a result, 10 latent factors emerged: 6 items for task comprehension, 6 items for practical experience (tacit knowledge), 6 items for collaboration, 9 items for management and problem-solving, 9 items for practical skills, 4 items for self-direction, 5 items for goal orientation, 5 items for adaptability, 5 items for relationship orientation, and 3 items for organizational loyalty. The developed scale comprehensively covers the multifaceted nature of competencies, allowing for a thorough evaluation of essential skills such as technical ability, teamwork, innovation, and leadership, which are critical for startups. Therefore, the scale provides a tool that helps startup managers objectively and accurately assess candidates' competencies. It also supports the growth of employees within startups, maximizing the overall organizational performance. By utilizing this tool, startups can build a strong internal talent pool and continuously enhance employees' competencies, thereby strengthening organizational competitiveness. In conclusion, the competency evaluation scale developed in this study is a customized tool that aligns with the characteristics of startups and plays a crucial role in securing sustainable competitiveness in rapidly changing market environments. Additionally, it offers practical guidance to support the successful growth of domestic startups and help them maintain their competitive edge in the market, contributing to the development of the startup ecosystem and the growth of the national economy.
The world is suffering from numerous human and economic losses due to the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19). The Korean government established a strategy to overcome the national infectious disease crisis through research and development. It is difficult to find distinctive features and changes in a specific R&D field when using the existing technical classification or science and technology standard classification. Recently, a few studies have been conducted to establish a classification system to provide information about the investment research areas of infectious diseases in Korea through a comparative analysis of Korea government-funded research projects. However, these studies did not provide the necessary information for establishing cooperative research strategies among countries in the infectious diseases, which is required as an execution plan to achieve the goals of national health security and fostering new growth industries. Therefore, it is inevitable to study information services based on the classification system and classification model for establishing a national collaborative R&D strategy. Seven classification - Diagnosis_biomarker, Drug_discovery, Epidemiology, Evaluation_validation, Mechanism_signaling pathway, Prediction, and Vaccine_therapeutic antibody - systems were derived through reviewing infectious diseases-related national-funded research projects of South Korea. A classification system model was trained by combining Scopus data with a bidirectional RNN model. The classification performance of the final model secured robustness with an accuracy of over 90%. In order to conduct the empirical study, an infectious disease classification system was applied to the coronavirus-related research and development projects of major countries such as the STAR Metrics (National Institutes of Health) and NSF (National Science Foundation) of the United States(US), the CORDIS (Community Research & Development Information Service)of the European Union(EU), and the KAKEN (Database of Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research) of Japan. It can be seen that the research and development trends of infectious diseases (coronavirus) in major countries are mostly concentrated in the prediction that deals with predicting success for clinical trials at the new drug development stage or predicting toxicity that causes side effects. The intriguing result is that for all of these nations, the portion of national investment in the vaccine_therapeutic antibody, which is recognized as an area of research and development aimed at the development of vaccines and treatments, was also very small (5.1%). It indirectly explained the reason of the poor development of vaccines and treatments. Based on the result of examining the investment status of coronavirus-related research projects through comparative analysis by country, it was found that the US and Japan are relatively evenly investing in all infectious diseases-related research areas, while Europe has relatively large investments in specific research areas such as diagnosis_biomarker. Moreover, the information on major coronavirus-related research organizations in major countries was provided by the classification system, thereby allowing establishing an international collaborative R&D projects.
Recently, the global insurance industry is rapidly developing digital transformation through the use of artificial intelligence technologies such as machine learning, natural language processing, and deep learning. As a result, more and more foreign insurers have achieved the success of artificial intelligence technology-based InsurTech and platform business, and Ping An Insurance Group Ltd., China's largest private company, is leading China's global fourth industrial revolution with remarkable achievements in InsurTech and Digital Platform as a result of its constant innovation, using 'finance and technology' and 'finance and ecosystem' as keywords for companies. In response, this study analyzed the InsurTech and platform business activities of Ping An Insurance Group Ltd. through the ser-M analysis model to provide strategic implications for revitalizing AI technology-based businesses of domestic insurers. The ser-M analysis model has been studied so that the vision and leadership of the CEO, the historical environment of the enterprise, the utilization of various resources, and the unique mechanism relationships can be interpreted in an integrated manner as a frame that can be interpreted in terms of the subject, environment, resource and mechanism. As a result of the case analysis, Ping An Insurance Group Ltd. has achieved cost reduction and customer service development by digitally innovating its entire business area such as sales, underwriting, claims, and loan service by utilizing core artificial intelligence technologies such as facial, voice, and facial expression recognition. In addition, "online data in China" and "the vast offline data and insights accumulated by the company" were combined with new technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data analysis to build a digital platform that integrates financial services and digital service businesses. Ping An Insurance Group Ltd. challenged constant innovation, and as of 2019, sales reached $155 billion, ranking seventh among all companies in the Global 2000 rankings selected by Forbes Magazine. Analyzing the background of the success of Ping An Insurance Group Ltd. from the perspective of ser-M, founder Mammingz quickly captured the development of digital technology, market competition and changes in population structure in the era of the fourth industrial revolution, and established a new vision and displayed an agile leadership of digital technology-focused. Based on the strong leadership led by the founder in response to environmental changes, the company has successfully led InsurTech and Platform Business through innovation of internal resources such as investment in artificial intelligence technology, securing excellent professionals, and strengthening big data capabilities, combining external absorption capabilities, and strategic alliances among various industries. Through this success story analysis of Ping An Insurance Group Ltd., the following implications can be given to domestic insurance companies that are preparing for digital transformation. First, CEOs of domestic companies also need to recognize the paradigm shift in industry due to the change in digital technology and quickly arm themselves with digital technology-oriented leadership to spearhead the digital transformation of enterprises. Second, the Korean government should urgently overhaul related laws and systems to further promote the use of data between different industries and provide drastic support such as deregulation, tax benefits and platform provision to help the domestic insurance industry secure global competitiveness. Third, Korean companies also need to make bolder investments in the development of artificial intelligence technology so that systematic securing of internal and external data, training of technical personnel, and patent applications can be expanded, and digital platforms should be quickly established so that diverse customer experiences can be integrated through learned artificial intelligence technology. Finally, since there may be limitations to generalization through a single case of an overseas insurance company, I hope that in the future, more extensive research will be conducted on various management strategies related to artificial intelligence technology by analyzing cases of multiple industries or multiple companies or conducting empirical research.
This survey was conducted to investigate the present status of farm tractor utilization for obtaining a basic reference to the establishment of the government's agricultural mechanization strategies. Thirty two counties from the eight provinces except Jeju were covered in this study. From these selected areas, 433 sample farms having farm tractor were taken to obtain the general informations by the enquete, and 93 sample farms among them to investigate the status of daily tractor use in the year of 1980. The analyzed results are summarized as follows: 1. Farm tractors owned by the rice-oriented farms holds 71.5 percent of the total number of tractors the livestock-oriented farms 17.0 percent, and the orchard-oriented farms 7.0 percent. Among the farm tractors 64.3 percent was a large size (46ps) and 35.7 percent a small size(19~23ps). 2. Most of the tractors surveyed were equipped with the essential attachments such as plow and rotavator. About 18 percent of the tractor owners had no trailer, which seemed too high considering the large percentage of tractor use for transportation. The availability of other attachments was very low except a grader on the rice-oriented farms and a hay harvester and a front loader on the livestock-oriented farms. 3. The average size of farm was 3.9 hectare for the rice-oriented farms, 13.9 hectare for the livestock-oriented farms and 7.4 hectare for the orchard-oriented farms. It was obious that the average farm size of was too small compared to the theoretical machine capacity of the tractors. 4. About 70 percent of the tractor operators were in the age of twenties and thirties. About 90 percent of them had an educational level of middle school graduate or above even though their technical level was very low. 5. Any particular problem in tractor use was not found in this survey. From the farmer's preference for purchasing a new tractor, however, it is estimated the demand on a 20-30ps tractor will be more increased. 6. The average annual use of tractor was of about 100 days or 400 hours. It appeared that the rice-oriented farms used most with 412.4 hours per year, and followed by the livestock-oriented farms with 403.6 hours, the orchard oriented farms with 377.7 hours. 7. Among the total hours of tractor use, 47.3 percent was for transportation, and 41.6 percent was for plowing and rotary tillage. The largest portion of the annual tractor use was taken by transportation on the livestock-oriented farms, by land preperation on the rice-oriented farms, and by loading and chemical spraying on the orchard-oriented farms. 8. The hours of tractor use had a peak in May. The hours of use for own farm was remarkably different among the different farm oriented, but there was no considerable difference between the too different sizes of tractor. 9. The hours of tractor use decreased as the age of the operator or the educational level increased. The reason might be that the operators who had a high educational level or were older had a tendency of disliking custom works. 10. The average custom use of tractor was 171.3 hours per year, and the ratio of custom work was 63.7 percent on the rice-oriented farms, 31.7 percent on the livestock-oriented farms and 22.4 percent on the orchard-oriented farms. Among the custom works, the most popular one was the grader leveling. 11. The charge on custom work was about 40,000 Won per hectare for plowing and rotary tillage, and it was the most expensive in the southeastern region, and next followed by the southwestern region. 12. The average plowing capacity of the small tractor was 7.8 hours per hectare in the paddy field, and that of the large tractors was 4.3 hours per hectare. The average rotary-tilling capacities of the small and the large tractors were 6.5 and 4.3 hours per hectare, in the paddy field respectively.
Customer Relationship Management(CRM) has been a sustainable competitive edge of many companies. CRM analyzes customer data for designing and executing targeted marketing analysing customer behavior in order to make decisions relating to products and services including management information system. It is critical for companies to get and maintain profitable customers. How to manage relationships with customers effectively has become an important issue for both academicians and practitioners in recent years. However, the existing academic literature and the practical applications of customer relationship management(CRM) strategies have been focused on the technical process and organizational structure about the implementation of CRM. These limited focus on CRM lead to the result of numerous reports of failed implementations of various types of CRM projects. Many of these failures are also related to the absence of marketing approach. Identifying successful factors and outcomes focused on marketing concept before introducing a CRM project are a pre-implementation requirements. Many researchers have attempted to find the factors that contribute to the success of CRM. However, these research have some limitations in terms of marketing approach without explaining how the marketing based factors contribute to the CRM success. An understanding of how to manage relationship with crucial customers effectively based marketing approach has become an important topic for both academicians and practitioners. However, the existing papers did not provide a clear antecedent and outcomes factors focused on marketing approach. This paper attempt to validate whether or not such various marketing factors would impact on relational quality and CRM performance in terms of marketing oriented perceptivity. More specifically, marketing oriented factors involving market orientation, customer orientation, customer information orientation, and core customer orientation can influence relationship quality(satisfaction and trust) and CRM outcome(customer retention and customer share). Another major goals of this research are to identify the effect of relationship quality on CRM outcomes consisted of customer retention and share to show the relationship strength between two factors. Based on meta analysis for conventional studies, I can construct the following research model. An empirical study was undertaken to test the hypotheses with data from various companies. Multiple regression analysis and t-test were employed to test the hypotheses. The reliability and validity of our measurements were tested by using Cronbach's alpha coefficient and principal factor analysis respectively, and seven hypotheses were tested through performing correlation test and multiple regression analysis. The first key outcome is a theoretically and empirically sound CRM factors(marketing orientation, customer orientation, customer information orientation, and core customer orientation.) in the perceptive of marketing. The intensification of
As business incubation centers (BICs) have been operating for more than 10 years in Korea, many early stage startups tend to use the services provided by the incubating centers. BICs in Korea have accumulated the knowledge and experience in the past ten years and their services have been considerably improved. The business incubating service has three facets : (1) business infrastructure service, (2) direct service, and (3) indirect service. The mission of BICs is to provide the early stage entrepreneurs with the incubating service in a limited period time to help them grow strong enough to survive the fierce competition after graduating from the incubation. However, the incubating services sometimes fail to foster the independence of new startup companies, and raise the dependence of many companies on BICs. Thus, the dependence on BICs is a very important factor to understand the survival of the incubated startup companies after graduation from BICs. The purpose of this study is to identify the main factors that influence the firm's dependence on BICs and to characterize the relationships among the identified factors. The business incubating service is a core construct of this study. It includes various activities and resources, such as offering the physical facilities, legal service, and connecting them with outside organizations. These services are extensive and take various forms. They are provided by BICs directly or indirectly. Past studies have identified various incubating services and classify them in different ways. Based on the past studies, we classify the business incubating service into three categories as mentioned above : (1) business infrastructure support, (2) direct support, and (3) networking support. The business infrastructure support is to provide the essential resources to start the business, such as physical facilities. The direct support is to offer the business resources available in the BICs, such as human, technical, and administrational resources. Finally, the indirect service was to support the resource in the outside of business incubation center. Dependence is generally defined as the degree to which a client firm needs the resources provided by the service provider in order to achieve its goals. Dependence is generated when a firm recognizes the benefits of interacting with its counterpart. Hence, the more positive outcomes a firm derives from its relationship with the partner, the more dependent on the partner the firm must inevitably become. In business incubating, as a resident firm is incubated in longer period, we can predict that her dependence on BICs would be stronger. In order to foster the independence of the incubated firms, BICs have to be able to manipulate the provision of their services to control the firms' dependence on BICs. Based on the above discussion, the research model for relationships between dependence and its affecting factors was developed. We surveyed the companies residing in BICs to test our research model. The instrument of our study was modified, in part, on the basis of previous relevant studies. For the purposes of testing reliability and validity, preliminary testing was conducted with firms that were residing in BICs and incubated by the BICs in the region of Gwangju and Jeonnam. The questionnaire was modified in accordance with the pre-test feedback. We mailed to all of the firms that had been incubated by the BICs with the help of business incubating managers of each BIC. The survey was conducted over a three week period. Gifts (of approximately ₩10,000 value) were offered to all actively participating respondents. The incubating period was reported by the business incubating managers, and it was transformed using natural logarithms. A total of 180 firms participated in the survey. However, we excluded 4 cases due to a lack of consistency using reversed items in the answers of the companies, and 176 cases were used for the analysis. We acknowledge that 176 samples may not be sufficient to conduct regression analyses with 5 research variables in our study. Each variable was measured through multiple items. We conducted an exploratory factor analysis to assess their unidimensionality. In an effort to test the construct validity of the instruments, a principal component factor analysis was conducted with Varimax rotation. The items correspond well to each singular factor, demonstrating a high degree of convergent validity. As the factor loadings for a variable (or factor) are higher than the factor loadings for the other variables, the instrument's discriminant validity is shown to be clear. Each factor was extracted as expected, which explained 70.97, 66.321, and 52.97 percent, respectively, of the total variance each with eigen values greater than 1.000. The internal consistency reliability of the variables was evaluated by computing Cronbach's alphas. The Cronbach's alpha values of the variables, which ranged from 0.717 to 0.950, were all securely over 0.700, which is satisfactory. The reliability and validity of the research variables are all, therefore, considered acceptable. The effects of dependence were assessed using a regression analysis. The Pearson correlations were calculated for the variables, measured by interval or ratio scales. Potential multicollinearity among the antecedents was evaluated prior to the multiple regression analysis, as some of the variables were significantly correlated with others (e.g., direct service and indirect service). Although several variables show the evidence of significant correlations, their tolerance values range between 0.334 and 0.613, thereby demonstrating that multicollinearity is not a likely threat to the parameter estimates. Checking some basic assumptions for the regression analyses, we decided to conduct multiple regression analyses and moderated regression analyses to test the given hypotheses. The results of the regression analyses indicate that the regression model is significant at p < 0.001 (F = 44.260), and that the predictors of the research model explain 42.6 percent of the total variance. Hypotheses 1, 2, and 3 address the relationships between the dependence of the incubated firms and the business incubating services. Business infrastructure service, direct service, and indirect service are all significantly related with dependence (β = 0.300, p < 0.001; β = 0.230, p < 0.001; β = 0.226, p < 0.001), thus supporting Hypotheses 1, 2, and 3. When the incubating period is the moderator and dependence is the dependent variable, the addition of the interaction terms with the antecedents to the regression equation yielded a significant increase in R2 (F change = 2.789, p < 0.05). In particular, direct service and indirect service exert different effects on dependence. Hence, the results support Hypotheses 5 and 6. This study provides several strategies and specific calls to action for BICs, based on our empirical findings. Business infrastructure service has more effect on the firm's dependence than the other two services. The introduction of an additional high charge rate for a graduated but allowed to stay in the BIC is a basic and legitimate condition for the BIC to control the firm's dependence. We detected the differential effects of direct and indirect services on the firm's dependence. The firms with long incubating period are more sensitive to indirect service positively, and more sensitive to direct service negatively, when assessing their levels of dependence. This implies that BICs must develop a strategy on the basis of a firm's incubating period. Last but not least, it would be valuable to discover other important variables that influence the firm's dependence in the future studies. Moreover, future studies to explain the independence of startup companies in BICs would also be valuable.
Trust has been studied extensively in psychology, economics, and sociology, and its importance has been emphasized not only in marketing, but also in business disciplines in general. Unlike past relationships between suppliers and buyers, which take considerable advantage of private networks and may involve unethical business practices, partnerships between suppliers and buyers are at the core of success for industrial marketing amid intense global competition in the 21st century. A high level of mutual cooperation occurs through an exchange relationship based on trust, which brings long-term benefits, competitive enhancements, and transaction cost reductions, among other benefits, for both buyers and suppliers. In spite of the important role of trust, existing studies in buy-supply situations overlook the role of trust and do not systematically analyze the effect of trust on relational performance. Consequently, an in-depth study that determines the relation of trust to the relational performance between buyers and suppliers of business services is absolutely needed. Business services in this study, which include those supporting the manufacturing industry, are drawing attention as the economic growth engine for the next generation. The Korean government has selected business services as a strategic area for the development of manufacturing sectors. Since the demands for opening business services markets are becoming fiercer, the competitiveness of the business service industry must be promoted now more than ever. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of the mutual trust between buyers and suppliers on relational performance. Specifically, this study proposed a theoretical model of trust-relational performance in the transactions of business services and empirically tested the hypotheses delineated from the framework. The study suggests strategic implications based on research findings. Empirical data were collected via multiple methods, including via telephone, mail, and in-person interviews. Sample companies were knowledge-based companies supplying and purchasing business services in Korea. The present study collected data on a dyadic basis. Each pair of sample companies includes a buying company and its corresponding supplying company. Mutual trust was traced for each pair of companies. This study proposes a model of trust-relational performance of buying-supplying for business services. The model consists of trust and its antecedents and consequences. The trust of buyers is classified into trust toward the supplying company and trust toward salespersons. Viewing trust both at the individual level and the organizational level is based on the research of Doney and Cannon (1997). Normally, buyers are the subject of trust, but this study supposes that suppliers are the subjects. Hence, it uniquely focused on the bilateral perspective of perceived risk. In other words, suppliers, like buyers, are the subject of trust since transactions are normally bilateral. From this point of view, suppliers' trust in buyers is as important as buyers' trust in suppliers. The suppliers' trust is influenced by the extent to which it trusts the buying companies and the buyers. This classification of trust using an individual level and an organization level is based on the suggestion of Doney and Cannon (1997). Trust affects the process of supplier selection, which works in a bilateral manner. Suppliers are actively involved in the supplier selection process, working very closely with buyers. In addition, the process is affected by the extent to which each party trusts its partners. The selection process consists of certain steps: recognition, information search, supplier selection, and performance evaluation. As a result of the process, both buyers and suppliers evaluate the performance and take corrective actions on the basis of such outcomes as tangible, intangible, and/or side effects. The measurement of trust used for the present study was developed on the basis of the studies of Mayer, Davis and Schoorman (1995) and Mayer and Davis (1999). Based on their recommendations, the three dimensions of trust used for the study include ability, benevolence, and integrity. The original questions were adjusted to the context of the transactions of business services. For example, a question such as "He/she has professional capabilities" has been changed to "The salesperson showed professional capabilities while we talked about our products." The measurement used for this study differs from those used in previous studies (Rotter 1967; Sullivan and Peterson 1982; Dwyer and Oh 1987). The measurements of the antecedents and consequences of trust used for this study were developed on the basis of Doney and Cannon (1997). The original questions were adjusted to the context of transactions in business services. In particular, questions were developed for both buyers and suppliers to address the following factors: reputation (integrity, customer care, good-will), market standing (company size, market share, positioning in the industry), willingness to customize (product, process, delivery), information sharing (proprietary information, private information), willingness to maintain relationships, perceived professionalism, authority empowerment, buyer-seller similarity, and contact frequency. As a consequential variable of trust, relational performance was measured. Relational performance is classified into tangible effects, intangible effects, and side effects. Tangible effects include financial performance; intangible effects include improvements in relations, network developing, and internal employee satisfaction; side effects include those not included either in the tangible or intangible effects. Three hundred fifty pairs of companies were contacted, and one hundred five pairs of companies responded. After deleting five company pairs because of incomplete responses, one hundred five pairs of companies were used for data analysis. The response ratio of the companies used for data analysis is 30% (105/350), which is above the average response ratio in industrial marketing research. As for the characteristics of the respondent companies, the majority of the companies operate service businesses for both buyers (85.4%) and suppliers (81.8%). The majority of buyers (76%) deal with consumer goods, while the majority of suppliers (70%) deal with industrial goods. This may imply that buyers process the incoming material, parts, and components to produce the finished consumer goods. As indicated by their report of the length of acquaintance with their partners, suppliers appear to have longer business relationships than do buyers. Hypothesis 1 tested the effects of buyer-supplier characteristics on trust. The salesperson's professionalism (t=2.070, p<0.05) and authority empowerment (t=2.328, p<0.05) positively affected buyers' trust toward suppliers. On the other hand, authority empowerment (t=2.192, p<0.05) positively affected supplier trust toward buyers. For both buyers and suppliers, the degree of authority empowerment plays a crucial role in the maintenance of their trust in each other. Hypothesis 2 tested the effects of buyerseller relational characteristics on trust. Buyers tend to trust suppliers, as suppliers make every effort to contact buyers (t=2.212, p<0.05). This tendency has also been shown to be much stronger for suppliers (t=2.591, p<0.01). On the other hand suppliers trust buyers because suppliers perceive buyers as being similar to themselves (t=2.702, p<0.01). This finding confirmed the results of Crosby, Evans, and Cowles (1990), which reported that suppliers and buyers build relationships through regular meetings, either for business or personal matters. Hypothesis 3 tested the effects of trust on perceived risk. It has been found that for both suppliers and buyers the lower is the trust, the higher is the perceived risk (t=-6.621, p<0.01 for buyers; t=-2.437, p<0.05). Interestingly, this tendency has been shown to be much stronger for buyers than for suppliers. One possible explanation for this higher level of perceived risk is that buyers normally perceive higher risks than do suppliers in transactions involving business services. For this reason, it is necessary for suppliers to implement risk reduction strategies for buyers. Hypothesis 4 tested the effects of trust on information searching. It has been found that for both suppliers and buyers, contrary to expectation, trust depends on their partner's reputation (t=2.929, p<0.01 for buyers; t=2.711, p<0.05 for suppliers). This finding shows that suppliers with good reputations tend to be trusted. Prior experience did not show any significant relationship with trust for either buyers or suppliers. Hypothesis 5 tested the effects of trust on supplier/buyer selection. Unlike buyers, suppliers tend to trust buyers when they think that previous transactions with buyers were important (t=2.913 p<0.01). However, this study did not show any significant relationship between source loyalty and the trust of buyers in suppliers. Hypothesis 6 tested the effects of trust on relational performances. For buyers and suppliers, financial performance reportedly improved when they trusted their partners (t=2.301, p<0.05 for buyers; t=3.692, p<0.01 for suppliers). It is interesting that this tendency was much stronger for suppliers than it was for buyers. Similarly, competitiveness was reported to improve when buyers and suppliers trusted their partners (t=3.563, p<0.01 for buyers; t=3.042, p<0.01 for suppliers). For suppliers, efficiency and productivity were reportedly improved when they trusted buyers (t=2.673, p<0.01). Other performance indices showed insignificant relationships with trust. The findings of this study have some strategic implications. First and most importantly, trust-based transactions are beneficial for both suppliers and buyers. As verified in the study, financial performance can be improved through efforts to build and maintain mutual trust. Similarly, competitiveness can be increased through the same kinds of effort. Second, trust-based transactions can facilitate the reduction of perceived risks inherent in the purchasing situation. This finding has implications for both suppliers and buyers. It is generally believed that buyers perceive higher risks in a highly involved purchasing situation. To reduce risks, previous studies have recommended that suppliers devise risk-reducing tactics. Moving beyond these recommendations, the present study uniquely focused on the bilateral perspective of perceived risk. In other words, suppliers are also susceptible to perceived risks, especially when they supply services that require very technical and sophisticated manipulations and maintenance. Consequently, buyers and suppliers must solve problems together in close collaboration. Hence, mutual trust plays a crucial role in the problem-solving process. Third, as found in this study, the more authority a salesperson has, the more he or she can be trusted. This finding is very important with regard to tactics. Building trust is a long-term assignment; however, when mutual trust has not been developed, suppliers can overcome the problems they encounter by empowering a salesperson with the authority to make certain decisions. This finding applies to suppliers as well.