• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
• /
• v.15 no.3 s.68
• /
• pp.461-471
• /
• 2007

Many Korean apparel firms have been adopting the global sourcing to enhance their competitive advantages. The purposes of this study were to identify the current status of global sourcing adopted by Korean apparel firms and to provide useful information for the other apparel firms planning the global sourcing. The questionnaire survey was conducted to 65 Korean apparel firms. The firms selected for this study were women's, men's, unisex casual wear manufacturers which made their products at offshore factories. The results show that about half of them started global sourcing before 2000. Unisex casual wear firms were already doing the global sourcing very actively and women's wear firms were followers. The major benefit of the global sourcing was the cost reduction. The firms that had made inroads into the global market find much satisfaction in global sourcing. These early adopters expected their sourcing countries as a future consumer market. The threatening elements of the global sourcing were the difficulties of quality control and labor cost rising. Cost and technical ability were considered importantly in selecting the global sourcing partners. The firms started the global sorucing before 2000 were greatly depended on offshore production. They concerned for the problems related to the global sourcing.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
• /
• 2005.10a
• /
• pp.1223-1230
• /
• 2005

The dynamic nature of the A/E/C industry, rapidly changing global market environments, and lowest cost competitive bidding make it difficult to survive in global design markets. To understand the global design markets, a case study has been undertaken. The top 150 global design firms represented in the ENR (Engineering News Record) from 1995 to 2003 are classified into three groups for the case study. First group is the firms which advanced in rank from 1995. Second group is the firms which maintained its rank from 1994 until 2003. Third group is the firms which went down in rank from 1995 until 2003. However, finding key factors and changing business strategies of successful top design firms are the fundamental goals in this paper. After examinations of case studies, this paper concludes and suggests that professionalization, M&A strategies, patrons of the government, and academic support are needed to be successful in the global design & engineering industry.

• Management Science and Financial Engineering
• /
• v.22 no.1
• /
• pp.21-26
• /
• 2016

We analyze how firms' global production activities affect their inventory supply and financial performance in regards to its production location. For the analysis, we use information on global production quantities of 3,076 Korean multinational firms that operate business in Europe and Asia through foreign direct investment (FDI) from 2006 to 2013. Our estimation results show that an increase in global production ratio, measured by global production/total production, decreases inventory supply and financial performance of firms that produce in European countries, while it decreases financial performance of firms that produce in Asian countries. Although our results indicate that global production decreases financial performance of firms that produce in Europe and Asia, we find that its negative effects on financial performance are different based on the market demand uncertainty.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
• /
• v.5 no.4
• /
• pp.9-20
• /
• 2018

Global rating agencies, such as Moody's and S&P, have assigned credit ratings to corporate bonds issued by Japanese firms since 1980s. Local Japanese rating agencies, such as R&I and JCR, have more market share than the global raters. We examine the yield spreads of 1,050 yen-denominated corporate bonds issued by financial firms in Japan from 1998 to 2014 and find no evidence that bonds rated by at least one global agency are associated with a significant reduction in the cost of debt as compared to those rated by only local rating agencies. Unlike non-financial firms, the reputation effect of global rating agencies does not exist for Japanese financial firms. We also observe that firms with less information asymmetry are more likely to acquire ratings from Moody's or S&P. Additionally, the firm's financial profile does not affect its choice to seek out ratings from global raters. Our findings are contradictory to those by Han, Pagano, and Shin (2012), who employ bonds issued by non-financial firms in Japan. Our conjecture is that the asymmetric nature of financial firms makes investors less likely to depend on a credit risk assessment by rating agencies in determining the yields of new bonds.

• World Technopolis Review
• /
• v.8 no.1
• /
• pp.21-42
• /
• 2019

The purpose of this research was to investigate the factors influencing global expansion/scalability of Kenyan Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). Factor analysis and multiple/multivariate regression analysis to determine the functional relationship between independent variables (factors) and the dependent variable was used. The independent variables were: innovation & technology, fitness/appropriateness of management, global marketing strategy; and support environment and the dependent variable, global expansion/scalability. Data was collected from a survey of randomly selected firms of 205, drawn from a population of 440 firms from Kenya Manufacturers Directory, with 175 firms responding. The key findings from the research in relation to Kenyan SMEs were that: there is a functional relationship between global market strategy and global expansion; there is a functional relationship between innovation and technology orientation and global expansion, there is no significant functional relationship between supportive environment of firms and their global expansion; and there is no significant functional relationship between fitness/appropriateness of management and global expansion/scalability. The implications for practice is that the ranking of the factors in order of priority supports focusing concern on the orientation of business strategy toward global market strategy, market research geared at obtaining foreign market intelligence, innovation and technology, product adaptation, service orientation, collaborative ventures, and long-range vision as key factors in making Kenyan firms successful in the international market. The implication for policy and practice is that there is need for collaboration between industry and government in pursuing policies for global expansion/scalability and among SMEs and large enterprises particularly in areas of rapid technological change.

• International Commerce and Information Review
• /
• v.8 no.4
• /
• pp.301-322
• /
• 2006

The change of the global environment, especially the development of the communication and transportation and the decrease of the trade barrier promotes the progress of globalization. Under this background, the globalization progress of Chinese electronic firms is also pushed forward, compared with the early firms, which is being quickly shortened. This study has some purposes. First, this tries to investigate the growth process of the Chinese electronics firms, by which reveals the progress of the global competition ability and the background of promoting their rapid globalization. Second, this study estimates and analyzes the implemented process of Haier's globalization strategy, which is the Chinese most representative global Firm. Finally, this article elaborates the globalization of Chinese firms and the apocalypse of the Korean firms and also shows the corresponding projects for them.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.11 no.9
• /
• pp.174-186
• /
• 2011

This research addresses global status of Korean media firms and their future directions. Mapping of major international media firms all over the world is used in order to explain global status fully. In the four categories that classified media firms using Forbes Global 2000 mapping, all Korean media firms are included in the fourth group, which is the weakest in terms of global competitiveness. Therefore, it is essential to trace appropriate global strategy from the media industry value chain that has competence. This paper finds out that Korea has advantage in the contents, terminal, and next generation networks. That means alliance strategies of contents-terminal-next generation network have advantage to evolve into global media firms. Moreover, Korean media companies should adopt selection and concentration strategy in terms of geographical expansion. As Korea's broadcasting and game contents are already popular in Asian and Latin American regions, they would better to enter the emerging markets. In so doing, terrestrial broadcasters and game service providers should lead the way.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
• /
• v.26 no.6
• /
• pp.751-762
• /
• 2002

Korean apparel industry is facing critical moment due to shortage of labor, wage increases and intensive competition among domestic manufactures. In addition, international production has been shifting to China and the other low-wage countries from established locations such as Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan. Global sourcing has been received considerable attention since firms can enhance their competitive advantage as well as comparative advantage by coordinating their sourcing activities global]y. This studs regarded global sourcing as one of the strategic tools to achieve competitive advantage of Korean apparel firms, and explored the current status by literature reviews and series of in-depth interviews with managers of korean apparel firms. The findings of this study were as follows: 1) Due to geographical advantage, China was the most favored nation for outsourcing for domestic markers. However, exporting firms preferred Latin America (including Mexico) to take advantage of duties, quotas and geographical proximity to the US market. 2) In selecting the global sourcing country, productivity, technical ability, local government regulation, and culture were considered important. 3) Most Korean apparel firms sources production globally, and followed by raw materials and trims. 4) Cost and quality were the most important factors in deciding subcontractors, and experience, productivity, equipment and finances were the next concerns. Academic implications and future directions were suggested based on findings.

• International Commerce and Information Review
• /
• v.14 no.2
• /
• pp.55-79
• /
• 2012

The previous studies based on a resource-based view of firm highlighted the role of resources within a firm in creating and sustaining competitive advantage. Recent research, however, the relational view points to the importance of inter-firm sources(or relational capital) in creating firm competitiveness. In international business field, the studies on born-global firms also states that when firms are lack of ownership-specific advantages in their internationalization process, they resort to the external partners and social networks to complement their resource scarcity. By adopting the relational view and born-global firms concept, a network-based approach needs to be applied to explain the international strategy of Korean service firms. This is because most of Korean service firms own less ownership-specific advantages than global competitors. This study proposes Korean firms' global network building and exploiting strategy to enhance their international stages of development. The network, for example, Global Korean Tourism Network, enables network members access to the valuable resources and capabilities they are lack of when undergoing internationalization process. This study's contribution is along two dimension. First, even global Korean network is emerging as a major issue in recent years, we could not figure out how to build global Korean network for service firms. This studies gives an answer. Second, we derived what benefits can be gained from the network if Global Korean Tourism Network is developed for hotel, tourism, convention firms' internationalization.

• International Commerce and Information Review
• /
• v.9 no.4
• /
• pp.199-214
• /
• 2007

This paper examines the international commerce expert capability and business performance in global supply chain management. Based on the analysis of eighty-seven cases, the following results were found. First it was found that CEO's capability of global supply chain management firms and business performance are significantly correlated. Second, supply chain management manager's capability of global supply chain management firms and business performance are not significantly correlated. Third, CEO's capability have more a positive influence business performance than supply chain management manager's capability in global supply chain management firms.