• Korean Management Science Review
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.135-150
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• 2014

This paper analyzes the operational efficiency of 91 individual retail stores in Seoul by a two-step procedure. In the first step, a data envelopment analysis (DEA) model is used to identify the efficiency scores. Three inputs (store size, number of items, and number of employees) and two outputs (sales and number of customers) are used for the efficiency measurement. In the second step, a Tobit regression model is used to identify the drivers of efficiency. DEA efficiency scores are used to test hypotheses on the impact of five independent variables, namely store age, number of items per store size, number of items per employee, trade area index, and number of competitors. Results of the Tobit analysis show that number of items per store size, number of items per employee, and number of competitors play a significant role in influencing the operational efficiency of retail stores. Managerial implications of the study are discussed.

• Journal of Korea Port Economic Association
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.115-148
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• 2005

In the liner market, a strategy is hard to sustain as competitors can easily imitate the strategy. For examples, when a number of shipping companies pursue this space exchange strategy in a liner market, their competitors are likely to build a cooperative alliance, following similar strategic pattern without any difficulty. Such strategic imitations are universal in international liner market. Therefore, the success of global alliance requires following critical considerations. First, the strategy of global alliance should be designed the way it gives the liner operators an economy of scale, which could be a key advantage in the competitive market. Second, thorough global alliance the lines should be able to improve their transport service through the reduction of operating costs and the business rationalization. The international alliance today is characterized by a strategic cooperation among a limited number of 'mega-carriers'. Such cooperation between the large-sized operators has come in many different forms. However, the trend has been towards the space exchange agreement, where a carrier on a route offers to another carrier a fixed number of spaces for a fixed period of time. the major carriers have been entered into groupings by integrating their services structures to increase market power. With reference to the above, this study has the following primary objectives: (1) to explore the present status of global alliance in liner shipping industry, (2) to prospect the future trend of the global alliance.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2009.05a
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• pp.161-167
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• 2009

This paper offers a competitor analysis model for use by contractors as parts of more informed approach in identifying key competitors, and as a basis for formulating bidding strategies. Linear mixed model approach is used in measuring competitiveness between bids (by using bid competitiveness percentage) according to: (i) project size, (ii) work sector; (iii) work nature; and (iv) number of bidders. The model was tested empirically by application to a bidding dataset obtained from a large Hong Kong contractor. Allowing for heterogeneity across competing contractors (i.e. with the model parameters that varied across contractors), the results indicate that competitiveness in bidding of this contractor is generally greater than the majority of his competitors.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.50
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• pp.251-275
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• 2011

This study represents the current situation on the Korean Government's investigation into the imports with the infraction of the country of origin indication law, showing how much those imports affect the purchasers as well as the domestic competitors in Korea. According to the HS 4 unit, the range of imports with the country of origin indication should be 55.2% of all imports, but it turned out there were actually 87.6% of them, according to the number of the import declarations in the first half year of 2010. The government's investigation on the infraction of the country of origin indication is conducted in the stages of customs and distribution into market. As a result of recent 4 years government's investigation into the imports with the infraction of the country of origin indication, the rate of inspection was averagely 3.6% of the reported number of imports in the stage of customs, the rate of the infraction of the country of origin indication cases was 0.14% of the total reported number, and 3.85% of the total actually inspected number. The investigation in the stage of distribution was below 20% level of the stage of customs inspection, on the number of caught cases basis. A survey of 4 categorized imports such as Watches, Tools, Glasses frames, and Clothes, which are assumed to happened frequently with the infraction cases, shows that the decreased sales rate of the domestic competitors was averagely 18.8% and the extent of the damage on consumers was 34.7% of the purchased prices, with both rates resulted from the investigation in the stage of distribution into market.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Building Construction Conference
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• 2007.11a
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• pp.109-113
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• 2007

This paper introduces a system, Simulation based Stochastic Markup Estimation System (S2ME), for estimating optimum markup for a project. The system was designed and implemented to better represent the real world system involved in construction bidding. The findings obtained from the analysis of existing assumptions used in the previous quantitative markup estimation methods were incorporated to improve the accuracy and predictability of the S2ME. The existing methods has four categories of assumption as follows; (1) The number of competitors and who is the competitors are known, (2) A typical competitor, who is fictitious, is assumed for easy computation, (3) the ratio of bid price against cost estimate (B/C) is assumed to follow normal distribution, (4) The deterministic output obtained from the probabilistic equation of existing models is assumed to be acceptable. However, these assumptions compromise the accuracy of prediction. In practice, the bidding patterns of the bidders are randomized in competitive bidding. To complement the lack of accuracy contributed by these assumptions, bidding project was randomly selected from the pool of bidding database in the simulation experiment. The probability to win the bid in the competitive bidding was computed using the profile of the competitors appeared in the selected bidding project record. The expected profit and probability to win the bid was calculated by selecting a bidding record randomly in an iteration of the simulation experiment under the assumption that the bidding pattern retained in historical bidding DB manifest revival. The existing computation, which is handled by means of deterministic procedure, were converted into stochastic model using simulation modeling and analysis technique as follows; (1) estimating the probability distribution functions of competitors' B/C which were obtained from historical bidding DB, (2) analyzing the sensitivity against the increment of markup using normal distribution and actual probability distribution estimated by distribution fitting, (3) estimating the maximum expected profit and optimum markup range. In the case study, the best fitted probability distribution function was estimated using the historical bidding DB retaining the competitors' bidding behavior so that the reliability was improved by estimating the output obtained from simulation experiment.

• The Journal of Information Systems
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.129-143
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• 1999

A great number of companies are currently examining the opportunities made available through the internet. This research aims to identify the factors that influence the adoption of the internet market. The innovation-IT-diffusion theory provide the theoretical foundation for this study. Seven factors were found to influence the adoption level of the internet market. They are top management support, cost efficiency, inclination toward new technology, absorptive capacity, institutional support, competitors move and customer pressure. Nonparametric test was used to test hypotheses. The results shows that top management support is the most important factor, and institutional support is not related to the adoption of the internet market.

• Journal of Technology Innovation
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.45-70
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• 2005

Much work on innovation has focused on the manufacturing sector. In this paper, we propose a framework for analyzing innovation in services centred on capability and technology integration. We illustrate the theoretical points made by conducting a case study on an international telephone communications provider Brastel, which introduced significant innovations in international calling services, in the form of rechargeable pre-paid calling card, through effective application of standard IT. Brastel is situated against its main competitors, considering two dimensions of price and service breadth and convenience. A novel technique for measuring competitiveness based on price and service index is introduced. The following competitors were selected: NTT, KDDI, Japan Telecom, Fusion Communications, J-Call / World Link, G-Call, ASP Check, Primus, QuickPhone, and MCI. To create the service index, factors such as ease of use, convenience, number of languages in which the services are available, and additional features were taken into account. The company itself and the rechargeable card innovation were analyzed through in-depth interviews and data collection. It was shown that a competitive advantage was maintained through internal and external capabilities.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.59-68
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• 2018

Purpose - This study empirically examines the effects of environmental dynamics(dynamics of one's own company, dynamics of competitors, and dynamics of customers), within the franchise industry, on the dependence and conflict(dysfunctional conflict and functional conflicts) and the business performances(financial and non-financial). Furthermore, we empirically examined the effects of the dependence of franchise on the conflicts(dysfunctional conflict and functional conflict) and business performances(financial and non-financial). Finally, we empirically examined the effects of the conflicts of franchise (dysfunctional conflict and functional conflict) on the business performances(financial and non-financial). Research design, data, and methodology - Our study conducted a survey on the managers and owners of the franchises located in Seoul, Gyeonggi, and Incheon. The total number of valid samples was 230, and the structural equation model was analyzed by using AMOS program. Results - First, the environmental dynamics(dynamics of one's own company, dynamics of competitors, and dynamics of customers) in the franchise industry were shown to have statistically significant positive effect on the dependence of franchise. Second, among the environmental dynamics in the franchise industry, the dynamics of one's own company and the dynamics of the customers were shown to have a statistically significant positive effect on the dysfunctional conflicts of franchisees. However, in the franchise industry, the dynamics of competitors did not have a statistically significant effect on the dysfunctional conflict of the franchise. Third, in the franchise industry, the environmental dynamics(dynamics of one's own company, dynamics of competitors, and dynamics of customers) did not have a statistically significant effect on the functional conflicts of the franchises. Fourth, the dependence of franchise was shown to have a statistically significant positive effect on the conflicts(dysfunctional conflict and functional conflict). Fifth, the dysfunctional conflict of franchisees was shown to have a statistically significant negative effect on the business performances(financial and non-financial). Sixth, the functional conflicts of franchises was shown to have a statistically significant positive effect on business performances(financial and non-financial). Conclusions - From the franchise industry researches, the environmental dynamics were selected as the preceding factors and the relationship leading to dependence, conflict, and business performance were constructed into model.

• Journal of Korea Society of Industrial Information Systems
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.76-84
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• 2003

Software agents reduce human involvement to a certain extent by automating routine tasks. However, most of agents have assisted with only a few steps in the multi-steps process of electronic transactions. In order to help users with the important steps in the electronic transactions, software agents need to persuade other parties to act in particular ways. While negotiations have many shapes and forms, this paper focuses on a particular class of negotiation, that is competitive business environment based negotiation. For negotiation with other parties in this contort, it is necessary for autonomous agents to consider environmental variables-the number of competitors, the number of negotiation parties, the maximum time by which they must finish their jobs, and user's preferences. Previous negotiation decision functions for the automated negotiation have used only time or the static numbs of negotiating parties as negotiation criteria, although competitive business environment should include potential competitors who can snatch negotiation parties away. This paper attempts to evaluate the performance of a negotiation decision function that considers the potential competitors in competitive market environment as well as that of a negotiation decision function that does not. For this evaluation, this study adopts the electronic marketplace as an application domain because many buyers and sellers compete for limited resources in the marketplace.

• The Korean Journal of Ecology
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.25-28
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• 2002

The advertisement call of anurans functions to attract potential mates. The dominant frequency of an advertisement call is generally getting lower with increased snout-vent length (SVL) of the caller Rana rugosa has an advertisement call tilth a particularly high frequency modulation. We conducted a playback experiment to verify the function of frequency modulation, and investigated the territorial behavior of the frog. The frog has five types of territory defense strategy. Strategy choice depended on the caller's SVL. Small males became satellites or lowered the dominant frequency of their advertisement call, whereas large males actively defended their territory with encounter calls. In response to high frequency (1107 Hz) playback, the frogs lowered their advertisement call frequency, and towered them further in response to the low frequency (1028 Hz) playback. In addition, the number of pulses in a call was increased in response to the playback. These results indicate that the frog avoids physical conflict with competitors by selecting a territory defense strategy suitable for the caller's size, and by lowering its call frequency to disguise its SVL.