Models of vertical product differentiation allow for the analysis of international trade in the presence of country asymmetries in terms of product qualities, technology, costs, market size, and income. In the presence of such asymmetries, national industries will either be market leaders or be...

This paper examines the relationship between organizational design and technological innovation in Chinese industry. In a principal-agent model, monitoring intensity is an endogenously determined input to innovation production. A recursive system of an innovation production function and a...

In this paper, the determinants of innovation behaviour and investment are explored with a large micro-data panel from West-German manufacturing firms. The estimates are discussed within a microeconomic model with monopolistic competition, demand uncertainty and a delayed adjustment of...

This paper reviews systematic research on collaborative work involving synchronous, or same-time, interactions, which comprise a major challenge for projects in which a distance of 30 metres or more separates participants. It identifies the specific advantages of close proximity, or 'radical...

This paper estimates price indexes for laptop personal computers using hedonic methods and data taken from PC Magazine technical reviews. We use benchmark test results to construct a measure of system performance that encapsulates factors that have previously gone unmeasured, such as the...

This paper contributes to the debate on the influence of electronic communication on the informal exchange of information among scientists and practitioners. The research is focused on an empirical analysis of three specialised Newsgroups in "speech technology" (comp.speech, comp.speech.research...

This paper derives a simple, but informative, model of firm R&D to figure out key factors that determine firm R&D effort. The model suggests a demand-pull, technology-push theory of R&D by showing that a firm's profit-maximizing R&D expenditure is determined jointly by both demand-side factors...

Science is an inherently collaborative enterprise and this trend has accelerated over the past few decades. In particular, the Internet creates new possibilities for the organization of joint scientific work, specifically among geographically separated collaborators. A notable instance of...