The objective of the paper is to confront the conclusions in the seminal papers of Lindbeck and Snower (2001, 2000, 1996) and Snower (1998) with the empirical evidence in the manufacturing sector, thus testing the from-Tayloristic-to-holistic-organization model. Starting from stylized facts as...

Firstly, we investigated the determinants of a) the propensity of Swiss firms to provide apprenticeship training, and b) the intensity of training (measured by the employment share of apprentices). We primarily were interested in the relevance as explanatory factors of the three constituent...

This paper explores the current state of play and likely future direction of business-tobusiness electronic commerce in the South African manufacturing sector. The empirical evidence presented draws on 120 firm-level interviews, and 31 personal interviews with industry experts. The research...

The Internet is often anticipated to have disruptive competitive impacts, causing upstart firms to overthrow incumbent market leaders. This paper uses the UK IT consulting industry as a test case to see whether such competitive impacts of the Internet might already be occurring. Comparable...

For a decade, economists have been fascinated by the phenomenon of open source software (OSS). OSS is marked by free access to the software and its source code. It is developed in a public, collaborative manner by thousands of non-paid volunteers as well as profit seeking firms. Today, OSS is...

Multivariate Tobit models are estimated using German cross?sectional data to test whether strategic complementarities exist between expenditures in four different types of ICT?components. If two ICT?components are complements, they are correlated (provided that agents act rationally)....

In markets with imperfect information and heterogeneity, the information technology affects the rate at which agents meet, which in turn affects the distribution of production technologies across firms. We show that in models for such markets there are typically multiple equilibria because...

The paper aims at explaining empirically the diffusion of E-commerce based on two largescale sample surveys conducted in the Swiss economy. The paper adds to previous work in two ways: firstly, we estimate separate models for E-selling and E-purchasing, and, secondly, we distinguish between...

The paper investigates empirically the decision of firms to adopt Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) based on a comprehensive specification of a rank model of technology adoption (complemented by epidemic effects) using firm-level data for the Swiss business sector. The explanatory...