June 2006
abstract
Gérer & Comprendre
Issue 84
Editorial
By Francis LEFEBVRE
Secrétaire général du Comité de rédaction
TRIAL BY FACT
A start-up looking for a business model, or the strategic art of trial and error
By Vincent BARTHELEMY,
doctorant au PREG-CRG Ecole Polytechnique,
and Thomas PARIS,
chercheur au CREG HEC, chercheur associé au PREG-CRG Ecole Polytechnique
Might trial and error not be the best strategy for launching a start-up? A success — in this field like in any other — makes us soon forget all the fruitless efforts and disappointed hopes. Thanks to a supple organization, Novo Ciné, a start-up in digital film-making, is trying to seize each and every opportunity. Its attempts (even, and especially, when they fail) are learning experiences that enable the company to reorient its activities without clashes and the departure of executives. Opening a new market requires time; and during the wait, life goes on. The scarcity of outside funds forces the company to turn a quick profit. A start-up can be motivated by a vision and, at the same time, recognize that every little bit helps.
Chronicles of an absorption by the marketplace: Free software
By Marie Coris,
maître de conférences, E3i, IFReDE-GRES, Université Bordeaux IV
Whether Alcove, Aurora, IdealX or Easter Eggs, they seemed, in 2000 and 2001, to be a threat to major French firms in the information industry owing to their proposal to supply customers with “freeware”. The financial bubble has burst, and investments in computers and software have been curbed. This has shattered the ideals of free soft ware and a broad autonomy for wage-earners. The freeware companies have survived by being absorbed into the marketplace.
IN QUEST OF THEORIES
Classical finance theory: A parenthesis of fifty years?
By Hélène Rainelli-Le Montagner,
professeur, IAE de Paris – GREGOR – Université de Paris 1-Panthéon Sorbonne
Financial scandals, biased analysts, unreliable traders… the methodological individualism of classical finance theory has come under question following the intense wave of speculation during the late 1990s. New studies have refocused on analyzing behaviors and institutions. This so-called “behavioral” finance theory has rediscovered descriptions from the 19th or early 20th century — before the mathematical models of the 1950s and 1960s. Though their criticism of the classical approach is effective, the new theorists must prove that they can design tools relevant for decision-making.
TRIAL BY FACT
Risk capital in industry: What are big groups going to do in start-ups?
By Alla BEN HADJ YOUSSEF,
docteur en sciences de gestion, chercheur associé :
IGS Paris (CR2S-Management)
CIME
and A2ID
Financial earnings are far from being the major criterion that big industrial groups use to invest in new-born companies. These groups have various motives: obtain knowledge about a technique or a new market, prove their social responsibility, or even use the investment in order to mange redundancy in their own work forces. This review of the literature and survey of six firms has brought to light a dozen objectives pursued by these groups. Two of them, detected in the field and validated by the model “Strategic intention/Poles of competence”, are new: pick up organizational innovations and identify opportunities for an absorption.
OVERLOOKED…
On grapes and men: Institutional regulation and the growth of AOC wines
By Sylvain Rousset,
ministère de l’Agriculture et de la Pêche, Paris,
Jean-Baptiste Traversac,
CESAER-INRA
and Dijon
The quality wine industry is a blend of state interventions and responsibility by wine-makers themselves. What economic or social justifications prevailed during the mixing of this hybrid form of regulation? What role must be assigned to the institutional environment? Can we understand the special ties between public authorities and firms without assessing the long-term prospects? EU regulations about wine quality are presented, along with the century-old history of institutional control over wines in France. After having served in the fight against fraud, the AOC label (appellation d’origine contrôlée) is being used to sell consumers on quality. But is a label of quality, even widely diffused, still effective in a competitive marketplace?
Mosaics
Piercing the secret of costs: An engineer’s view of how firms operate —
On Claude Riveline’s Évaluation des coûts. Éléments d'une théorie de la gestion.
By Frédéric Kletz
Europe, what have you done to bookkeeping?
On Michel Capron’s Les normes comptables internationales.
By François Engel
Relocated: Reasons to be optimistic —
On Suzanne Berger’s Made in monde.
By Colette Depeyre
Taiwan, a textbook case for understanding the new globalized economy
On Suzanne Berger and Richard Lester’s Global Taiwan: Building competitive strengths in a new international economy.
By Yih-teen Lee
Saving private capitalism!
On Patrick Artus and Marie-Paule Virard’s Le capitalisme est en train de s'autodétruire.
By Dominique Jacquet
DEBATED
Are the French really “damned”? On Jean-Pierre Dupuis’s article, “Being a ‘damned Frenchman’ in management in Quebec”
À propos de l’article de Jean-Pierre Dupuis : « Etre un ‘maudit français’ en gestion au Québec »
In our September 2005 issue, Jean-Pierre Dupuis from Quebec dealt with a taboo: the deep unease in business relations between partners from Quebec and France that is often put into words as “damned Frenchmen”. Drawing from interviews with several parties and the history of relations between the two countries, Dupuis concluded that these anti-French feelings can be set down to the rather conservative French immigration over the last two centuries and the predominance of English-speakers in the world of business. The issues of immigration and language thus turn out to be tightly linked to problems of intercultural management. Monique Lepage, a Frenchwoman settled in Quebec and married to an inhabitant, did not experience aggressiveness and declares that Dupuis’ analysis is false and outdated. Christian Labezin, a Frenchman who heads a firm he set up in Montreal, cites a few telling examples to illustrate the cultural shock that the French experience in Quebec and shed light on their inferiority complex in business. Dupuis replies, and sticks by his analysis.