Arturo Rodríguez-Castellanos

Organisational capacity to absorb external R&D: industrial differences in assessing intellectual capital drivers

Being competitive entails continuously performing product and process innovations. The acquisition of externally generated R&D is therefore increasingly important. However, firms have different needs when performing this process. The paper presents 26 drivers of intellectual capital (IC) as crucial for the absorption of externally generated R&D. Additionally we identify divergences in a range of companies in management attitudes to the assessment of these IC factors. Our analysis is based on empirical research carried out in the northern Spanish Basque Country. The results support the development of instruments and strategies for the absorption of externally generated R&D.

Identifying, measuring, and valuing knowledge-based intangible assets : new perspectives

The main scope of the book is to highlight the importance of intangible resources in business management, evidenced in their measurement and financial valuation, and the need for a strategic analysis that enables them to be identified and then assessed--Provided by publisher.

The intangibles’ mindset of CFOs’ and corporate performance

This paper aims to analyze the companies’ view about the financial valuation of intangibles relevance and its influence on corporate performance. Based on the theory of resources, the role of intangibles in business competitiveness is justified. The traditional factors of production have become secondary, while the success is primarily based on the development and utilization of intangible resources. One of the main problems in managing the intangibles appears to be that, there is a general lack of information about them. Therefore, financial valuation of intangibles will result in significant benefits to the organization that will help determine business strategy, process design as well providing competitive advantage. It follows the hypothesis of this work, the greater known about their intangibles and the greater sensitivity to the financial valuation of them, the better performance. To achieve this objective, a field study is done, doing telephone calls to Basque Country companies’ financial managers.

Impact of Relational Capital on Business Value

Intangible resources, or intellectual capital, are currently known to be the drivers of economic growth. Todays society is known as the knowledge-based society. Knowledge is the main strategic resource that is capable in itself of generating new knowledge. Therefore, intangible resources have become the competitiveness base for any company, as their ownership provides the company with the opportunity to generate sustainable competitive advantage and increases the value of the company. One of the most important dimensions of intellectual capital is the relational capital (Prahalad and Ramaswany, 2000). Relational capital is defined as the knowledge embedded in the relationships with any stakeholder that influences the life of the organisation. Relationships with stakeholders are the necessary condition for building, maintaining and renewing resources, structures and processes over time, as firms can access critical and complementary resources through external relationships. Some authors [Prahalad, CK and V Ramaswamy (2000). Co-opting customer competence, Harvard Business Review, 78(1) 79–87.] suggest that the customer has become a new source of obtaining competitive advantage for the organisation. The customer and satisfaction have become the aim of companies as it is only way to attain sustainable performance. Companies that improve their relations with their clients, and the satisfaction of the latter, will therefore achieve a better business performance and will increase their value. There is a gap in the literature about this topic. Few works have been done in this aspect; for that, our research thus seeks to analyse whether customer satisfaction is reflected in the total value of the intangibles. A sample of the main Spanish companies, those quoted on the IBEX-35 (the main index of reference of the Spanish Stock Exchange, comprising the 35 companies with greatest liquidity on the Spanish Stock Exchange) are included and the relationship between the relational capital, measured by satisfaction of customers variable, and the total value of the company has been analysed. A positive relationship is then obtained between both variables, that is, improved customer satisfaction is positively associated with an increased business value, but that is not statistically significant.

Proactive Management of Core Competencies, Innovation and Business Performance in a Period of Crisis: The Case of Spain

At present, it is known that intangible resources are the drivers of economic growth through innovation; intangibles have become the key resource for generating competitive advantage; what’s more, they are the fundamental source of business value. Numerous authors think that a concrete type of intangible resources, the core competencies, are the key factors that drive innovation and thus are able to be a source of competitive advantage. Nevertheless, there are few studies that analyse the relationship between investments in core competencies and business performance. For that reason, our objective is to test whether the proactive management of core competencies, through the investment into them, is translated into improved results in a period of crisis.

The Relationship Between Proactive Management of Core Competencies and Business Performance

Intangible resources drive economic growth, and are considered the fundamental source of business value. Intangibles have become key factors in generating competitive advantages, despite the fact that traditional financial reporting continues to focus on tangible assets. This is primarily due to the fact that the majority of intangible resources are invisible and considered a current expense on financial statements.Top level management on the other hand may be discouraged from investing in intangible resources, even though numerous studies link investments in R&D, advertising, and training, to the performance of the company. Studies also suggested that core competencies, as a form of intangible human capital, are critical competitive factors and essential elements of corporate competitive advantage. Despite that, few studies analyse the relationship between investments in core competencies and corporate performance. The main objective of this study is to attempt to fill the gap in this area of the current literature and test the extent to which investments in core competences, translates into direct improved organisational performance.The field study was conducted by making telephone calls to the financial managers of different Basque Country companies. Their responses and the financial performance of their companies was analysed and reported in this study. Results from the study show that firms with managers whom affirm their investment in intangible resources have better overall growth and sustained economic development.

Globalisation and the unpredictability of crisis episodes, An empirical analysis of country risk indexes

The ongoing globalisation process has not put an end to international financial crises. On the contrary, it seems to have contributed to their appearance and to accentuating their degrees of unpredictability. In this context, the main objective of the present study is to establish whether the values of the best-known and most widely used country risk indexes, namely, the Euromoney index and the International Country Risk Group (ICRG), and the values of their representative variables could have forecasted well in advance the crises that took place between 1994 and 2002, a period which is herein termed the ‘globalisation era’. The results show that, although the selected indexes and their representative variables were able to identify certain vulnerabilities, they could not accurately identify the political, economic, and/or financial factors that developed prior to these crisis episodes. / Aunque la actual crisis muestra entre los factores causantes de su desencadenamiento ciertas propiedades unicas, no puede obviarse el hecho de que comparte algunas caracteristicas con las crisis anteriores que se produjeron especialmente a partir de 1994. Y una de estas caracteristicas es la imprevisibilidad. El objetivo del presente trabajo es contrastar si los indices mas conocidos y utilizados (el indice de Euromoney y el ICRG) y las variables mas representativas incluidas en su configuracion fueron capaces de anticipar las crisis que tuvieron lugar entre 1994 y 2002, esto es, las crisis de la “era de la globalizacion”. Los resultados obtenidos son negativos, por lo que se concluye que el valor de los indices y el valor de las variables en ellos contenidas se muestran incapaces de reflejar con suficiente antelacion —a medio plazo— las vulnerabilidades que se desarrollaron previamente al surgimiento de los episodios de crisis.

Crises and unpredictability in developing countries

Abstract Developing countries have suffered most of the financial crises in the context of the process of economic and financial globalisation. Both current and previous crises have revealed that unpredictability is a feature common to all the episodes which occurred during the process of globalisation. Although certain alarms went off, any of those external financial crises were actually predicted by the advanced methods in use for prediction and country risk analysis. Taking into consideration the information above, the aim of this paper is to check the ability to foresee external financial crises in developing countries of both the country risk index published by Euromoney and the Credit Ratings variable included therein. We have focused on the external financial crises that took place between 1992 and 2011, that is, in a full globalisation era. The results are negative. It appears that neither the index nor the sovereign ratings are able to reflect early enough the vulnerabilities that arise previously to the setting off the crisis episodes. This leads us to conclude that the existing models of country risk have limits. Thus, it would necessary to develop new instruments to measure this risk, considering uncertainty as an essential feature of the current economic and financial environment.

Characteristics of Support Programmes for Setting Up Spin-Offs in Spanish Universities

This paper seeks to validate the models of support programmes for setting up spin-offs found in the literature analysing the differentiating characteristics of the various types of programmes existing in Spanish universities. To do this, a survey was conducted among managers of these programmes to obtain the necessary information. Secondly, the variables characterising these programmes were established by performing a factorial analysis. Thirdly, based on these variables, several different types of programme were identified in Spanish universities using cluster analysis. Finally, the differentiating characteristics of each of the types found were identified by means of Anova and logistic regression analysis. Four types of programme were found with differences in terms of human resources, experience, commitment, proactivity, selectivity, type and number of spin-offs created and the involvement in their management. Two successful models were identified from among the four types of programmes found. This study confirms the importance of R&D activity as a determinant of the results of support programmes for setting up spin-offs in universities. However, the suggestion in the literature that programmes usually begin with a policy of low selectivity was not confirmed.

A Model for the Management in Organizations Based on People and Knowledge: Aspects to Be Considered in Its Design

As Professor Gil-Aluja states, the progressive uncertainty and complexity in business and economic systems highlights the relevant role of people, basis for the generation of intangible resources that are the source of business competitiveness. Thus, the relevance of intangibles in the current society, especially those based on knowledge and people, makes them a strategic issue for the organizations, due to the competitive advantage that they can generate, and also by their impact on results. Intangibles are under research and study both in the scientific-academic and in the corporate spheres. In this work we intend to consider some aspects in the design and implementation of an efficient model for the management in organizations, based on people and knowledge. To do this, we review the literature on the matter, as well as apply to the observation of some relevant cases of implementation of related models in companies belonging to different territorial spaces. Results, especially from the observation of practical cases, suggest that there is an enormous difficulty in the phases of implementation and maintenance in time of these models, possibly due to the difficulties that emerge to evaluate and monetize adequately their actual cost and the benefits obtained.