Effective Utilization of Government-Provided CTI by Small Businesses within the Defense Industrial Base

There are two broad objectives of the research reported in this paper. First, we assess whether government-provided cyber threat intelligence (CTI) is helpful in preventing, or responding to, cyber-attacks among small businesses within the U.S. Defense Industrial Base (DIB). Second, we identify ways of improving the effectiveness of government-provided CTI to small businesses within the DIB. Based on a questionnaire-based survey, our findings suggest that government-provided CTI helps businesses within the DIB in preventing, or responding to, cyber-attacks providing a firm is familiar with the CTI. Unfortunately, a large percentage of small firms are not familiar with the government-provided CTI feeds and consequently are not utilizing the CTI. This latter situation is largely due to financial constraints confronting small businesses that prevent firms from having the wherewithal necessary to effectively utilize the government-provided CTI. However, we found a significant positive association between a firm’s familiarity with the government-provided CTI and whether a firm is being periodically reviewed by the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency (DCSA) or is compliant with the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) program. The findings from our study also show that the participating firms believe that external cyber threats are more likely to be the cause of a future cybersecurity breach than internal cybersecurity threats. Finally, our study found that the portion of the IT budget that small businesses within the DIB spend on cybersecurity-related activities is dependent on the perception that a firm would be the target of an external cyber-attack.

An Instrument Variable Model of the Impact of Financing Decisions on Performance of Small Businesses in Australia＇s Pre-global Financial Crisis

Firm level empirical research on the impact of financing decisions on small business performance is scarce in the Australian context. This study adopts an instrument variable （IV） approach to analyze the impact of financing decisions, in particular, equity or debt are obtained, on the performance of small businesses by using the panel data from Australian Bureau of Statistics （ABS） Business Longitudinal Database （BLD） 2004-2005, 2005-2006, and 2006-2007. Performance variables, i.e., sales and expenditure, are used as dependent variables. Equity and debt obtained are used as independent variables （or known as treatments）. IV includes size of the business, age of the business, number of locations, and industry division etc.. The results from IV modeling outperformed those obtained from OLS （Ordinary Least Squares）. Findings include： （1） financing has significantly positive impacts on the performance of small businesses in Australia; （2） equity and debt financing are used as alternatives, comparatively, equity financing is preferred; （3） capital purchases are largely funded by debt financing, while non-capital purchases and salary expenses are funded by equity financing; and （4） equity financing is more often used by firms with increasing capital purchases and declining non-capital purchases, while debt financing is used by firms with the opposite trends. The paper concludes with a discussion of the limitations of this research and future research＇s directions.

A Review of Cybersecurity Challenges in Small Business: The Imperative for a Future Governance Framework

Technological shifts—coupled with infrastructure, techniques, and applications for big data—have created many new opportunities, business models, and industry expansion that benefit entrepreneurs. At the same time, however, entrepreneurs are often unprepared for cybersecurity needs—and the policymakers, industry, and nonprofit groups that support them also face technological and knowledge constraints in keeping up with their needs. To improve the ability of entrepreneurship research to understand, identify, and ultimately help address cybersecurity challenges, we conduct a literature review on the state of cybersecurity. The research highlights the necessity for additional investigation to aid small businesses in securing their confidential data and client information from cyber threats, thereby preventing the potential shutdown of the business.

The Labor Law and the Preferential Treatment for Small Businesses

Tens of millions of small businesses, including countless individually run businesses, are operating in China. Hampered by their scale and limited job creation capacity, China＇s small businesses need a more flexible approach to employment. In fact, their small size and their lack of technical expertise and standardized management mean that these small businesses find it hard to operate in strict compliance with labor laws in the way larger businesses do. Some other countries and regions tend to give preferential treatment to small businesses, exempting them from some of the provisions of labor law. China could consider changing the ＂one size fits all＂ provisions of its labor law to give preferential treatment to small businesses with regard to terminating employment contracts, drawing up regulations, signing contracts, and anti-discrimination in employment requirements.

Hope for Small Businesses

By the end of this year, China’s small and medium-sized enterprises will get aboost as the growth enterprise market board begins trial

Review of IT/IS Adoption and Decision-Making Behavior in Small Businesses

The increased use of information technologies has led to more research on information technology/information system （IT/IS） adoption and decision-making behavior in small businesses to improve information utilization. This paper presents an extensive review of the literature on IT/IS adoption to identify the key factors affecting small businesses based on comparison analysis. The review identifies the current interest in the adoption of Internet based IT and points out that the factors affecting different stages of the business lifecycle and research variables should be selected in terms of the different technology types. Especially, the review emphasizes the characteristics of external openings on the network in the research on e-commerce adoption. Future studies should focus on IT/IS adoption and implementation in small and medium-sized businesses during the development of small and medium-sized industrial clusters and specialty towns.

Knowledge Acquisition in Small and Medium Businesses

This article applies to the process of organizational knowledge acquisition by managers and specialists with the possession of manager license. The theoretical part explains： concepts of knowledge, knowledge management, knowledge sources, and the step of creating and acquiring knowledge. The research part focuses on the presentation and analysis of obtained results of research performed by the author.

Modelling trust evolution within small business lending relationships

Trust is a key dimension in the principal-agent relationship and it has been studied extensively.However,the dynamics,evolution,and intrinsic motivation and mechanisms have received less attention.This paper investigates the intrinsic motivation of trust and it proposes a theoretical model of trust evolution that is based on the notion of‘trust response’and‘trust spiral’.We then specifically focus on trust within the lending relationship between banks and small businesses,and we run numerical simulations to further illustrate the evolution of involved mutual trust over time.Our model provides implications for future research in both trust evolution and small business lending relationships.

Regulatory constraint and small business lending:do innovative peer-to-peer lenders have an advantage?

This paper investigates whether innovative Peer-to-Peer lending by FinTechs’has a regulatory advantage over the big banks in respect of small business lending.We do this through the lens of the regulations imposed by the Dodd-Frank Act,using a difference-in-difference methodology.The Act tightened traditional bank credit standards on business loans,especially for small firms.However,the new FinTech lenders were not subject to the same regulatory burden.We find that traditional banks significantly reduced their lending to small businesses,as compared to their FinTech competitors.Our results suggest that while the Dodd-Frank Act constrained lending to small businesses,innovative new lending models gained a regulatory advantage and the Peer-to-Peer lenders capitalized on this.

Study of Impacts of Small Business Innovation Research Programs

The development and commercialization of new technologies are important to the global economy. In this paper, the author first addresses Small Business Innovation Research （SBIR） background ; then, implicitly defines SBIR ; finally, I also analyze the impacts of smaU business innovation research programs. There are four aspects ： entrepreneurial orientation; environmental factors; organizational factors and performanee.

International Practice of Fast-Growing Innovative Companies

The purpose of the article is to compare the conditions of development and support of fast-growing companies in European countries, Asian countries, and Russia. The comparative analysis performed is of interest as certain countries, including Russia, face the problem of economic slowdown. However, the fast-growing companies are powerful catalysts for the growth of the gross domestic product and the employment of the population. The conclusion of the study is that there are common patterns in ongoing support programs for fast-growing companies： long term, state support, innovative company orientation, and concessional financing. At the same time, there are fundamental differences in approaches to the state support for innovative companies. The first approach relates to the natural development of the fast-growing innovation companies and their support programs （Germany, Denmark）; the second approach is aimed at artificially stimulating the growth of such companies （South Korea）. In Russia there are institutional features of supporting fast-growing companies： small businesses are the most vulnerable part of the economic system and they require state support in crisis situations. Therefore, the experience of European and Asian countries in terms of supporting innovative and fast-growing companies can have a positive impact on the development of innovative companies in Russia. And definitely it is important to try to understand the nature of Russian innovative fast-growing companies： do we see them as entrepreneurial business as we do in the Western companies？

The Use of the ICTs in the Value Chain Proce,;ses and Their Impact on Organizational Performance

Companies are currently immersed in a process of competitiveness, which is increasingly more complicated to achieve differentiation that can guarantee you the preference of customers and consequently the success of the organization. It becomes partly crucial for the organization to be in the dynamics of the sector and market where it operates and wants its consolidation, because value systems become strategic elemente that play a role as key factors of success in organizations seeking priority intend to increase their organizational performance. Given the above, this research seeks to get to identify strategic uses of information and communication technologies in the processes of the value chain in small commercial businesses in Mexicali, aiming to contribute to the improvement of the competitiveness of the same. It is in this sense that the technologies of information and communication have become a powerful tool that will allow them to be innovative, cost-effective and this will have an impact on the performance of the organization that will allow you to improve your service, interact with customers and suppliers, and above all more efficiently meet their own needs and organizational expectations. This research was exploratory and within the relevant findings, coming to the conclusion that it is necessary to focus more emphatically on the client; organizations have deficiencies in relation to the strategic use of ICTs to streamline their billing, manufacturing, distribution, and storage of your products, activities highlighting this if they don＇t have a reconsideration in this aspect, at the risk of offset in terms of its competitors which would mean ceasing to be option on the market, stressing that this not only will be a trigger factor in mature companies, but those who need to improve their service and that they will serve as input for the conduction of processes along the value chain. The research is exploratory in nature, as evidenced in the use of the ICTs focused on the man~,gement of the value chain and its relationship with different variables of such management, making that they are discovered behaviors on the structure of the value chain able to generate sustainable benefits and contribute to the improvement of the competitive position of the companies involved in this study.

A Study on Empowerment of Rural Women Through Microcredit Facilities in Sri Lanka

This study seeks to examine the impact of micro credit facilities on women empowerment in the context of the great importance being given to the entrepreneurs. Access to credit can help women by enabling them to start and expand small businesses, often accompanied by market access. This study has the research problem--whether the micro credit facilitates in empowering women entrepreneurs in the rural areas of Sri Lanka. Therefore, the study has the primary objective to identify the impact of micro credit on empowerment and the sub to assess the relationship among them. The study adopts a causal survey research design through which 337 members of microfinance institutions （MFIs） in the study area of Northern Province in Sri Lanka were selected using stratified random sampling and data collected from them by using a structured questionnaire. Correlation and regression analysis has been used to find out the impact of micro credit facilities on empowerment of women entrepreneurs in the rural areas of Sri Lanka. Linear multiple regression analysis was used to determine the micro credit facilities that affect women empowerment by using SPSS. The model summary indicates that 10.9% of the variation in the women empowerment can be explained for the micro credit facilities and remaining 89.1% influencing by other factors, such as education, experience, income, etc. The study concluded that micro credit facilities alone do not support the entrepreneurs to enhance them and it makes the policy recommendations to guide development of micro credit facilities that are beneficial to the clients and other stakeholders of the MFI institutions.

Exploring a targeted approach for public health capacity restrictions during COVID-19 using a new computational model

This work introduces the Queen's University Agent-Based Outbreak Outcome Model(QUABOOM).This tool is an agent-based Monte Carlo simulation for modelling epidemics and informing public health policy.We illustrate the use of the model by examining capacity restrictions during a lockdown.We find that public health measures should focus on the few locations where many people interact,such as grocery stores,rather than the many locations where few people interact,such as small businesses.We also discuss a case where the results of the simulation can be scaled to larger population sizes,thereby improving computational efficiency.

Tax enforcement activities:Evidence on the impact of a threat-of-audit letter

As part of their ordinary enforcement activities,tax authorities around the world use letters and other forms of personalised communications to elicit tax compliance at a low cost.The literature shows that the impact of a threat-of-audit letter(TAL)depends critically on the credibility of the letter which,in turn,depends on the information disclosed to the taxpayer.We study a TAL that is credible because it also uses third-party information to target a form of cost manipulation but,at the same time,incentivises alternative forms of cost manipulation by not targeting them.We find that the direct impact on the targeted cost manipulation is stronger than the strategic increase in other costs,and therefore the overall effect of the TAL on taxable income is positive.Our approach can be applied to any letter or enforcement action that reveals information to taxpayers and thus prompts their strategic responses.By observing the taxpayers’responses along all relevant dimensions,the tax authority can evaluate the impact of the strategy and also obtain valuable information to target future enforcement activities.