Archive for January, 2009
Internet usage is an important determinant in closing the Digital Divide (Jain, 2002). Internet access brings many benefits to a country and its citizens. These benefits include information on health and education, finding lower prices for goods and services, increased business efficiency, the creation of new jobs, and increased trade. Here, however, the problems (costs) associated with installing wire-lines re-surface. In North America and Europe, two regions of the world with high Internet usage rates, the vast majority of Read the rest of this entry »
The term Digital Divide usually refers to the overall gap in information technology and communication usage between developed and developing countries (Lu, 2002). Currently there are huge differences in the ability of people around the world to communicate both locally and globally. The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) provides free statistics, available on their Web site, on IT usage rates in five broad regions of the world. These regions are: Africa, Americas (including North, Central and South), Read the rest of this entry »
Consequently, it is necessary to have good measures of equity risk for managers, planners and investors. The cost of equity is important in valuing new investment opportunities and in evaluating the ongoing performance of established business projects. This is especially true in the new economy IT industry where an understanding of equity risk aids in the examination of the relationship between the IT sector and economic development. Read the rest of this entry »
Foreign investment can be categorized as either foreign direct investment (FDI) or foreign indirect investment (portfolio investment). FDI adds to the receiving country’s GDP because it involves investment in physical capital (roads, buildings, plants, machinery and equipment, etc.). Portfolio investment has a less direct impact on economic growth when it involves the buying and selling of existing equities and bonds.
Of course, portfolio investment used to finance initial public offerings adds directly to GDP. Read the rest of this entry »
Productivity growth can be influenced by a number of different factors or drivers. Broadly speaking, these factors include macroeconomic policy, regulatory environment, innovation, industrial structure, human capital, management strategies and policies, trade, and investment. For large industrialized countries like those in the G7 or G10, economic performance depends in large part on coordinating the actions between these various drivers to enhance productivity. The shortage of the necessary resources to accomplish this Read the rest of this entry »
Abstract
In this chapter, quantitative modeling and simulation techniques are used to estimate various risk measures and the associated cost of equity for the global telecommunications industry. Our approach is to calculate several different cost-of-equity values and then use simulation techniques to build up a probability distribution for each company’s cost of equity. In this way, a clearer picture of where a company’s cost of equity lies is developed. Closing the Digital Divide could bring many benefits to developing countries but international investors and development planners must be able to make their own cost-of-equity calculations so that they can see first hand how their investment projects compare with other investment projects around the globe. Read the rest of this entry »
At the end of the day following the introduction of Ecom there could be fewer intermediaries in a vertical value chain. However, vertical value chains have lost their attractiveness in a time of increasing returns based on scope-wise innovations in product. Products in this setting of Ecom offer sequential competition. Firms and their customers coordinate their expectations based on the next versions of products. Similarly, firms that are competing in sequence or at the same time must coordinate their expectations on each other Read the rest of this entry »
The argument of Krafft and Ravix or Leijonhufvud regarding the failure of the market to offer solutions to a coordination problem when there are two types of delays, namely that on information delay and investment gestation lags, has led to organizational and interorganizational solutions. They include Teece or Langlois and Robertson, who have found vertical integration of several firms as solutions to longer delays or varieties of contracts as solutions to shorter delays. We observed that delays when caused by strategic intentions or Read the rest of this entry »
Strategic expectations of economic agents, several producers complementors and intermediaries experience deterrence caused by durability of investment. Durability reduces uncertainty, shows commitment and exacts reciprocal durability of investment from other parties. Ex-post plan and existing technological paths are durable too. Novelty in technology or innovation and reduced durability of investment allow economic agents to engender differentiation of labor and increase in lengths and numbers of nested circuits of a Read the rest of this entry »
Epochal increase in the average delay reflects the general rise in capital and in divisions of labor. Systemic increase in delay reflects an increase in divisions of labor. The velocity with which an intermediate product might move through Ecom intermediaries reflects technological pace and the productivity but that hastened velocity cannot compensate for the lengthened divisions of labor. Prior to its appearance, technology is uncertain. However, following its appearance, it determines the circuit of production and hence the plans for Read the rest of this entry »