Elisabeth T. Pereira

Determinants of Touristic Attraction in Portuguese Regions and Their Impact on GDP

The tourism sector is considered a powerful stimulator of national economies because it affects those economic sectors associated with it, and at the same time creates jobs, increases domestic demand, contributes positively to the balance of payments and allows a better reallocation of wealth. Recognizing this importance, it becomes relevant to investigate the impact of tourism in Portugal at the regional level in order to compare the different Portuguese regions and identify their determinants of attraction. After characterizing the Portuguese tourism market, the authors undertake an empirical analysis, based on a panel data analysis for the Portuguese regions classified by NUTs II and for the period 1990–2007. The results suggest that Lisbon is the region that contributes most to Portuguese GDP because its tourism product is more differentiated.

The clusters development as a factor of competitive advantage

This study examines the cluster concept and the importance of developing clusters to obtain and sustain competitive advantages, either as a regional competitive factor or to the level of industrial competitiveness.

Economics of Next-Generation Networks

Telecommunication networks are made of links and nodes. Links and nodes are interconnected through compatible interfaces in order to form the physical topology. A link receives information in one interface and places it in all the other interfaces; a node receives information in one interface and places it in some of the other interfaces. The nodes must be able to take decisions in order to route the information through the appropriate interfaces. This ability to take decisions can be given to the node by some form of manual configuration or can be acquired automatically through routing protocol. The nodes can be themselves source or destination of information.

Utilization of fiber to the home as a Blue Ocean Strategy to gain competitive advantage

The telecom industry has become overcrowded with companies trying to address limited markets with similar product offerings. Operators need to have the right strategy for upgrading their Access Networks to keep up with the never ending need for higher data rates. This paper examines how deploying FTTH can be the perfect Blue Ocean Strategy to gain a competitive advantage in providing differentiated services at lower costs. Drivers for FTTH and the technical, economical, and strategic benefits of using that technology will be discussed. The applicability of the Blue Ocean Strategy principals and their implementation in FTTH will be analyzed.

The importance of small knowledge intensive firms in European countries

Smart, sustainable and inclusive growth is the basis for European 2020 strategy, in which small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are considered the backbone of European countries economies. The present study aims to investigate the relationship between the main variables that characterises small knowledge intensive firms (SKIFs) and the importance of their business expenditure on research and development (BERD). To achieve this, European member states were analysed during the period between 2008 and 2012 using a clusters analysis. Through this study it is possible to conclude that countries that have high growth values on SKIFs also achieve growth in GDP and BERD.

Are the Most Competitive Countries the Most Innovative Ones

Tourism is an important economic activity in current world economy. According to the World Travel and Tourism Council (World Economic Impact Report, 2013) this industry has grown faster than other industries. In modern economies, innovation is an essential factor for the competitiveness of firms, and being the tourism industry one of the most promising industries in the world, is relevant to understand the contribution of innovation to the competitiveness of this industry. So, this study aims to relate the competitiveness of tourism with innovation. With this propose a comparative analysis of a set of touristic countries is conducted, based on their score in the Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index and in a set of innovation’s variables. The obtained results suggest that in the last years the competitiveness of regions had increased more in the continents of Asia, Africa and Europe, and that the more competitive countries are advanced economies. For other side, the countries with a high level of innovation are correlated with a high competitive level, and countries with a low competitive level observed an increasing incentive to innovate.

The internationalisation of Portuguese SMEs

This paper begins with an overview of the history of Portuguese entrepreneurship over the last century. Next, the study analyses the importance of SMEs in actual competitive environment of international markets, investigating the case of the internationalisation of Portuguese businesses (processes, modes of entry, strategies and intentions and reasons of internationalisation) and the principal features of Portuguese entrepreneurship and SMEs on domestic and foreign markets.