Technological change is often hypothesized as one of the main drivers of merger activities. This paper analyzes the role of technology in mergers and acquisitions (M&As) at the firm level. Based on a newly created data set that combines financial information and patent data for public limited...

Zahlreiche Studien weisen auf hohe Misserfolgsquoten von Unternehmenszusammenschlüssen hin, messen dies jedoch vor allem anhand finanzieller Indikatoren, während eine mitarbeiterbezogene Betrachtung unterbleibt. Kritisch wird die Situation, wenn hochqualifizierte, aber unzufriedene...

This paper presents some ideas about determinants of merger waves and some evidence on their effect on profitability and employment. A brief survey of previous merger waves and an analysis of the recent one give support to the hypothesis that sectoral shocks are at the root of merger waves....

Most FDI takes place between the developed countries, which suggests that the market-seeking motive is important for understanding FDI. However, given the stylized fact that trade barriers (e.g. transportation costs and financial barriers) have declined over the past 20 years, models that aim to...

This paper aims to investigate the effect of knowledge characteristics on the total factor productivity of firms developing drugs in the pharmaceutical industry. We decompose knowledge into knowledge associated with the technological firm portfolio and knowledge related to R&D projects, which...

This paper empirically investigates whether donor countries punish sovereign defaults by reducing foreign aid ows. Our findings reject the hypothesis formulated in the theoretical literature that a default leads to a loss of foreign aid for the defaulting country. Creditor countries directly...

Die Lissabon-Agenda sieht eine Steigerung der Ausgaben für Forschung und Entwicklung bis zum Jahr 2010 auf drei Prozent des Bruttoinlandsprodukts vor. Europa will damit zu einem der wettbewerbsfähigsten und dynamischsten Wirtschaftsräume werden. Wesentlich für die Zukunftsfähigkeit eines...

In recent years stock exchanges have been increasingly diversifying their operations into related business areas such as derivatives trading, post-trading services and software sales. This trend can be observed most notably among profit-oriented trading venues. While the pursuit for...

Academic contributions on the demutualization of stock exchanges so far have been predominantly devoted to social welfare issues, whereas there is scarce empirical literature referring to the impact of a governance change on the exchange itself. While there is consensus that the case for...

We analyse pricing, effort and tipping decisions in the online service Google Answers. While users set a price for the answer to their question ex ante, they can additionally give a tip to the researcher ex post. In line with the related experimental literature we find evidence that tipping is...