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Technology transfer (TT) in industry to university collaboration (UIC) literature focuses primarily on a macro view within an SME environment. While these discussions are important to establish the significance of encouraging UIC's as the value is important to both parties, there is a need for further research at a micro level to help understand key approaches to ensuring the success of the TT. By looking at how value created from TT for a multi-national corporation (MNC) with a project based within a single subsidiary, this research effectively looks at the issue from both a SME level (the subsidiary independently) and a MNC level.

The research uses a longitudinal knowledge transfer partnership and action research to form a case study of Parker Hannifin's Gas Separation and Filtration Europe, Middle East and Africa (GSFE) division.

The research highlights the key areas to focus on in ensuring a successful TT within an UIC such as: once identifying the gap that a UIC is filling in the company, identifying internal barriers before the project starts; education of why change is necessary and then using knowledge experts to educate on the new processes being introduced and finally; incorporation of a full range of personnel, not just those directly involved in the day-to-day of the UIC.

As a case study, further research is required to make the results more generalisable. One way to do this would be to evaluate previous successful and unsuccessful UIC's and determine if the success criteria identified were present in these programmes.

There are three critical points that can be taken away from this research and applied to any company looking to use UIC for TT and value co-creation. Education, external knowledge experts and business wide inclusion were highlighted in the findings as being potentially critical turning points and need to be addressed for successful TT.

Successful UIC's further encourage investment in such programmes which has greater societal benefits. Not only can we see greater leaps in industry through better, more specific knowledge being transferred from the university, the industry knowledge fed into universities helps to guide research and teachings.

The micro level view created by action research based from the industry partner perspective adds another level of importance as the “how” for overcoming barriers is clearly addressed. Furthermore, the research looks at how a multi-national corporation can have value added through UIC's within subsidiaries which often is not addressed in the literature.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the role of the commitment between small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and their banks in Nigeria from the perspective of the senior SME employees. The antecedents to, and outcomes from, commitment that underpin these crucial business-to-business (B2B) relationships are quantified as part of a proposed relationship model.

In total, 850 SMEs located across three Nigerian regions were targeted leading to the achievement of 491 complete surveys. The data collected comprised various validated items from which scales were developed. Data collection was supported by means of face-to-face interviews with senior SME representatives. Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equations modelling (SEM) were employed to validate the research model and quantify the associated relationships.

Two dimensions of commitment are relevant here, namely, the affective and calculative components. The key respective antecedents to these commitment dimensions are trust and social bonding for affective commitment and costs related to benefit loss for calculative commitment. Affective commitment has the greater marginal effect on SMEs’ behavioural intentions towards their banks.

The research could be expanding further in future studies through consideration of the banks’ perspectives alongside those of the SMEs as consumers.

This lies in the assessment of the relationships’ strengths and characteristics from the perspectives of SMEs as clients, a sector under-represented in relationship marketing research and in a location where B2B relationships have perhaps not been fully supported by their banking sector.

This paper examines the British fashion retailer Jigsaw in its strategy of “individualising” its outlets in the highly competitive British high street environment. In order to distinguish itself in the marketplace as an independent retailer with an acute sense of site and to maximise the impact of its outlets in a diverse range of locations, Jigsaw has deliberately commissioned a series of designers to create a series of memorable and challenging interiors with much resulting critical and financial success. This paper examines the work of two contrasting architects and their interior work, highlighting the individualistic approach to the high street taken by Jigsaw. This proactive attitude taken to both the place and face of design in its outlets has allowed Jigsaw both to tailor its image as required and to add perceived value to its merchandise. This paper examines the impact that design has had in facilitating this success.

Dentists, whilst recognizing, in the main, the need to be more marketing oriented still have some way to go to improve the perception of themselves and their services in the eyes of the public. Research indicates various barriers to attendance, some of which could be minimized by elementary marketing considerations, e.g. accessibility to potential patients. Reviews the literature to determine what these barriers are together with indications of how these issues could be addressed. A survey of the UK dental schools indicates a lack of a marketing input until the postgraduate vocational training year. Given changes in the way in which dentists are being remunerated and the well‐documented problems which they face in encouraging people to use their services, suggests that perhaps an earlier and more systematic application of marketing principles is needed. The research indicates that major barriers are fear and cost. Discusses possible ways in which basic marketing principles could be used to mitigate their effects.

Studies the methods used to ensure that new product development in an industrial and technical environment is market led. Begins with the customer active paradigm of Eric Von Hippel, and then develops a proactive approach to new product development. Reports on a three‐year action programme applied to a UK division of a multinational corporation. Although the study is concentrated on one in‐depth longitudinal example, the authors are confident that the results can be applied more widely.

There is a dearth of published research on the assessment of idea generation techniques. Helps to rectify this and examines idea generation techniques within the new product development process by an in‐depth study of the measuring, checking and precision instruments industry (SIC 3710). Data were collected from 47 companies using telephone interviews. Over 80 per cent of manufacturing respondents claimed to use some form of idea generation technique in their new product development process for new product idea generation or problem solving purposes, with larger companies using more techniques than smaller ones. However, none of the companies’ last new product was initiated by the use of an idea generation technique. It is therefore difficult to justify the resources that idea generation techniques presently consume. The origin of most new product ideas was the customer.

It has been accepted that enhancing the satisfaction of employees, especially customer‐contact employees is important as they can significantly and positively influence customers' satisfaction. In order to improve satisfaction of customer contact employees – caddies in Chinese golf clubs, this paper explores the internal service quality of caddy managers' encounters with caddies from a dyadic perspective (the view of caddy managers and of caddies).

A qualitative multiple‐case study methodology was adopted; using critical incident interviews to collect the data. In order to make sense of the data, narrative analysis is used to interpret favourable and unfavourable stories that are related by participants and why the storytellers told the stories in such a way.

Nine dimensions were found to construct the internal service quality of caddy mangers in internal service encounters between caddies and caddy managers. They are reliability, responsiveness, assurance, empathy, communication, consideration, fairness, recognition and flexibility.

The outcome of this research can help the management team to better manage the internal service encounters between managers and caddies in order to improve caddies' satisfaction during service encounters. It can assist Chinese golf clubs in recruiting and training caddy managers.

This research extended the service quality framework to the Chinese golf industry. There have been no previous studies conducted in this sector.

Purchases of luxury fashion brands continues to grow rapidly in metropolitan China, creating a significant global marketplace. Associated behaviour is maturing, exhibiting levels of sophistication and is risk averse, consequently, purchasing intention and willingness to pay more represent areas for marketer consideration, as do the potential impact of consumer‐perceived brand value and affect on these outcomes.

A survey of 431 Chinese consumers located in Beijing was undertaken within shopping malls specialising in luxury brands, fashion items included. The analysis undertaken considers the influence of value and affect on purchase intention and consumers’ willingness to pay extra, achieved by deploying confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equations modelling (SEM).

Functional and social value positively influence consumers’ willingness to pay premium prices, impending purchase intentions and affective attitude towards luxury brands, functional value consistently acting as the more dominant predictor, with attitude further directly influencing purchase intention. Symbolic values afforded by consumers influence to some extent affective attitude, but not willingness to pay, whilst the direct effect on purchase intention is counter intuitive.

The research was restricted to Beijing, where consumer behaviour understanding is transferable to other key Chinese conurbations, but not necessarily to the majority of the country, where disposable income levels and consumer relationships with fashion and luxury are recognisably different.

This centres on setting and recognition of the key antecedents of purchase intention and a propensity to pay more for items of fashion and luxury.

The purpose of this paper is to assess brand commitment levels demonstrated by luxury brand consumers in China and seeks to identify the most significant combination of antecedents from brand affect, image, value and trust.

A self-completion, researcher-supported questionnaire was disseminated within four Beijing shopping malls, generating 501 participants. The questionnaire comprised a range of scale sets covering brand affect, image, value, trust and commitment. The analysis comprised a summary overview of brand attainment followed by a substantive analysis involving confirmatory factor analysis and structural equations modelling to identify the most significant combination of antecedents relating to brand commitment.

Regarding absolute consumer endorsement, brand affect was the most positive area, with image, trust and value representing relatively positive brand attributes. Declared commitment was relatively low, representing a potential commercial challenge. Value, represented by its social and symbolic components, and trust were identified as providing a significant and direct explanation of consumer commitment, represented by its affective and continuance dimensions. The role of value and trust must be central in marketing luxury brands given their direct and combined impact on consumer commitment.

The findings are transferable to other “Tier 1” locations in China, but take no account of either consumer behaviour outside of these wealthier conurbations, or segmentation of the associated markets.

Geographic setting and consideration of a vast consumer group provides research value and contribution to marketing planning in the pursuit of higher levels of consumer commitment to their brands.

Application of the numerical method to the art of Medicine was regarded not as a “trivial ingenuity” but “an important stage in its development”; thus proclaimed Professor Bradford Hill, accepted as the father of medical statistics, a study still largely unintelligible to the mass of medical practitioners. The need for Statistics is the elucidation of the effects of multiple causes; this represents the essence of the statistical method and is most commendable. Conclusions reached empirically under statistical scrutiny have mistakes and fallacies exposed. Numerical methods of analysis, the mathematical approach, reveals data relating to factors in an investigation, which might be missed in empirical observation, and by means of a figure states their significance in the whole. A simplified example is the numerical analysis of food poisoning, which alone determines the commonest causative organisms, the commonest food vehicles and the organisms which affect different foods, as well as changes in the pattern, e.g., the rising incidence of S. agona and the increase of turkey (and the occasions on which it is served, such as Christmas parties), as a food poisoning vehicle. The information data enables preventive measures to be taken. The ever‐widening fields of Medicine literally teem with such situations, where complexities are unravelled and the true significance of the many factors are established. Almost every sphere of human activity can be similarly measured. Apart from errors of sampling, problems seem fewer and controversy less with technical methods of analysis then on the presentation and interpretation of figures, or as Bradford Hill states “on the application of common sense and on elementary rules of logic”.