http://hdl.handle.net/10397/1070 Search the Channel search http://repository.lib.polyu.edu.hk/jspui/simple-search http://hdl.handle.net/10397/5716 Title: Green retailing : construct measurement and its antecedent-adoption-performance relationships<br/><br/>Authors: Tang, Kit Yee<br/><br/>Abstract: The emerging trend of "greening" has led retailers to recognize the importance of integrating environmental management practices into their retail value chain operations. However, prior literature lacks research on the topic of Green Retailing (GR), which is largely unexplored in terms of its construct measurement, adoption, antecedents, and performance outcomes. In this study we aim to (i) establish a theoretical framework to identify the different dimensions and roles of retailers in the adoption of GR, (ii) conceptualize and empirically validate the measures of GR, (iii) identify the motives of firms to adopt GR, and (iv) examine the performance implications of GR adoption. To achieve these objectives, we carried out a study organized in three inter-related stages to obtain answers to address the research issues pertinent to GR. We first conducted an exploratory qualitative study focusing on the GR-oriented approaches and practices undertaken by world-class retailers to explore the phenomenon of GR in the retail industry. We then carried out a quantitative survey study with data collected from 141 retailers in Hong Kong to empirically validate the theoretical measures developed in this study for evaluating GR adoption and to test the hypothesized GR antecedent-adoption-performance relationships. Finally, we performed a qualitative analysis using secondary data from 375 publicly traded retailers in Japan to seek further empirical evidence in support of our findings.; Our results reveal that GR consists of three dimensions: internal-improvement based GR, external-coordination based GR, and supportive-development based GR with a total of ten practices subsumed under these dimensions. The ten practices are green store operations, green transportation, green procurement, green product design, green packaging, green promotion, green after-sales service, green policy, green research development, and green human resource development. We also find that environmental regulatory pressure, customer pressure, supplier pressure, and competitive pressure as perceived by retailers are positively associated with the extent to which GR is adopted by retailers. In addition, we obtain empirical evidence that GR adoption is positively associated with the financial and environmental performance outcomes of the retailers. The findings of this research are useful to researchers striving to come to grips with the important issues associated with GR - its phenomenon, antecedents, dimensions, and impact on firm performance. We provide managerial insights from the theoretical findings to guide practitioners on the ways to design and plan for the greening of their retail activities. This study also provides a helpful reference for policy makers, assisting them in formulating proper environmental regulations and promoting voluntary measures for environmental protection for the retail industry.<br/><br/>Description: 218 p. : ill. ; 30 cm.; PolyU Library Call No.: [THS] LG51 .H577P LMS 2012 Tang Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/10397/5542 Title: Technologically new products and value creation : an event study and the moderating effect of knowledge characteristics<br/><br/>Authors: Liu, Xiaojin<br/><br/>Abstract: The development of technologically new products (TNPs), in which advanced technology is incorporated in new product development, is crucial for firms to gain competitive advantage. However, extant literature is limited in providing understanding of the relationship between TNPs and their financial implications. Based on a sample of 475 major innovation awards for TNPs between 1987 and 2006 in the U.S., we examine the financial impact of TNPs. We further investigate how the knowledge characteristics of a firm that develops TNPs moderate the relationship between TNPs and financial performance. We examine three types of firm knowledge characteristics, which are firm's absorptive capacity, knowledge impact and knowledge breadth. Our research is based on objective data from COMPUSTAT and the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) patent database. We find support for an overall positive impact of TNPs and reveal that the impact of TNPs on financial performance is stronger when firms have higher absorptive capacity and more impactful knowledge. However, knowledge breadth negatively moderates the financial impact of TNPs. Our research supports a knowledge-based view of new product development - firms with higher absorptive capacity, more impactful knowledge but narrower (instead of broader) knowledge base obtain stronger financial returns from products they develop.<br/><br/>Description: vii, 86 p. : ill. ; 30 cm.; PolyU Library Call No.: [THS] LG51 .H577M LMS 2012 Liu Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/10397/5351 Title: Approximability of vehicle routing problems<br/><br/>Authors: Xu, Liang<br/><br/>Abstract: Vehicle Routing Problems (VRPs) can be described as a class of combinatorial optimization problems that seek to determine a set of feasible routes for a fleet of vehicles to serve customers at different locations, so as to optimize certain objective functions. Due to the growth of the transportation and logistics industries, many new VRPs are emerging in different contexts. Since they are usually NP-hard, these problems call for the design of approximation algorithms that achieve constant approximation ratios. Moreover, in the existing literature there are several VRPs whose constant-ratio approximation algorithms are either unknown or improvable. Therefore, in this thesis we study the approximability of the following three categories of VRPs, by either developing the constant-ratio approximation algorithms or deriving approximation hardness results. The first category of problems includes the min-max Path Cover Problem (PCP) and its variants, which aim to determine a set of k paths for k vehicles to serve customers in a metric undirected graph, so that the maximum total edge and vertex weight among all paths is minimized. This category of problems was introduced in the literature in the context of "vehicle routing for relief efforts". Since they are relatively new in the literature, approximation algorithms are almost unknown. We consider four variants of the min-max PCP, in which the vehicles have either unlimited or limited capacities, and they start from either a given depot or any depot of a given depot set. We have developed approximation algorithms for these variants, which achieve approximation ratios of max{3 - 2/k, 2}, 5, max{5 - 2/k, 4}, and 7, respectively. For these four variants of PCP, we have also proved their first approximation hardness results, by showing that unless P=NP, it is impossible for them to achieve approximation ratios less than 4/3, 3/2, 3/2, and 2, respectively.; The second category of problems includes the min-max k-Traveling Salesmen Problem on a Tree (k-TSPT) and its variants. With k a given positive integer denoting the number of salesmen, which is independent of the input size, the min-max k-TSPT aims to determine a set of k tours for the k salesmen to serve all the customers that are located in a tree, such that the k tours all start from and return to the depot, so as to minimize the maximum length of the k tours. In the literature, the question as to whether or not the min-max 2-TSPT yields a pseudo-polynomial time exact algorithm has remained open for a decade. We have provided a positive answer to this open question by developing a pseudo-polynomial time exact algorithm using a dynamic programming approach. Based on this dynamic program, we have further developed a fully polynomial time approximation scheme for the problem. Moreover, we have generalized these algorithms for the min-max k-TSPT for any given constant k ≥ 2, and we have extended them to other variants. The third category of problems includes the k-depot Traveling Salesmen Problem (k-depot TSP) and its variants. The k-depot TSP is an extension of the single-depot TSP, and it aims to determine a set of k tours for the k vehicles to serve all the customers on a metric undirected graph so that the total length of the tours is minimized. We have shown that a non-trivial extension of the well-known Christofides' heuristic has a tight approximation ratio of 2 - 1/k, which is better than the existing 2-approximation algorithm available in the literature. This result is significant when k is small. Moreover, we have demonstrated how this algorithm can be applied to the development of approximation algorithms for other multiple-depot VRPs.<br/><br/>Description: xiv, 142 p. : ill. ; 30 cm.; PolyU Library Call No.: [THS] LG51 .H577P LMS 2012 Xu Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT http://hdl.handle.net/10397/5350 Title: Matching demand and supply of short life-cycle products by trading capacity futures<br/><br/>Authors: Hung, Yick-hin<br/><br/>Abstract: The mismatching risk of the newsvendor due to demand uncertainty is a fundamental issue in inventory research. Risk pooling is a potent strategy to reduce the underlying demand uncertainty through aggregation. However, past research has been confined to investigating risk pooling among parties within a single supply chain network. We argue that the risk can be pooled and shared among different supply chains, and it can also be transferred to the public via financial derivatives, provided that suppliers have short lead-time capacities that allow retailers to replenish stocks within the season. We treat such reserved capacity (super capacity) as a commodity that can be traded as futures to retailers and speculators. Consider a sub-industry of a certain family of short life-cycle products in which a group of suppliers have comparable production capabilities to produce goods for their "newsvendor-type" of retailers, who sell non-identical products in the market. Under the framework of a two-stage inventory model, the retailers buy physical goods and super capacity futures as inventory portfolios in the first stage. After demand realization in the second stage, the retailers make replenishment decisions, which are limited to the capacity futures on hand. However, the retailers are allowed to form coalitions to transfer the residual capacity futures among themselves. Therefore, the retailers can make bidirectional adjustments to their inventory positions. This mechanism also helps improve supply flexibility and increases the utilization of suppliers' reserved capacity.; The dissertation consists of three parts. First, we examine a case involving only two supply chains that are engaged in a co-opetition game. We compare the two scenarios in which super capacity futures can and cannot be exchanged between the two supply chains in stage two, and prove that Pareto improvement can be obtained. Second, we extend the model to a group of n retailers and m suppliers to form a sub-industry. We employ a biform game to analyze the risks and payoffs to the retailers as players in both the non-cooperative (first) and cooperative (second) stages. Our findings reveal that the retailers can improve their payoffs by sharing risk among different supply chains. Third, we allow the game of trading of super capacity to include speculators from both the sub-industry and the public. We argue that to hedge against risk, the retailers can further share and transfer their risks to the speculators by means of trading super capacity as futures or as options in futures. Our results show that the whole sub-industry is better off with super capacity trading even with the presence of outside speculators. In this thesis we also develop a time-based, value-adding capacity measurement model, which is an output-orientated input measure for super capacity trading among different supply chains involving various products. Our study establishes that trading super capacity futures is an efficient mechanism for individual newsvendors to improve their performance in matching demand with supply by combining operational and financial hedging strategies to reduce and share the mismatching risk that is caused by demand uncertainty within a sub-industry and with the public.<br/><br/>Description: xix, 150 leaves : ill. ; 30 cm.; PolyU Library Call No.: [THS] LG51 .H577P LMS 2011 Hung Sat, 01 Jan 2011 00:00:00 GMT