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This research explores innovation of traditional SMEs that do not actively invest in innovation. Elements of open innovation have been identified in these firms in their effort to build social capital which they perceive as pertinent to their businesses. The result of the research shows that instead of using social capital as means for innovation, the unintentional practice of open innovation has contributed to the development of social capital, which further opens up potential for globalization. As a result, a model of open innovation as means of developing social capital for enhancing globalization potential for SMEs was developed.

This article discusses the new gaming law in Macau with emphasis on the critical aspects concerning the gaming operators, concession regime, and other regulatory obligations.1 Thanks to the gaming liberalization commenced in 2001,2 Macau has experienced tremendous economic growth. The past two decades have seen the rapid development of large-scale integrated resorts, and Macau now ranks among the world's major gaming jurisdictions.3 Policy and regulatory challenges have also emerged along with the growth of the junket-driven VIP business in casinos.4 With the recent amendment of Law No. 16/2001 and the subsequent enactment of Law No. 16/2022, Macau has strengthened the legal underpinnings of its system of gaming regulation to oversee various groups involved in casinos and their industry practices. The present study is among the first to review the scope and impact of the revised gaming law, and associated managerial and operational implications for Macau casinos. Topics covered include policy directions, concession requirements, industry participants, gaming taxes, and fair business practices. This study could provide insights into the “Macau 2.0” project and how casinos are to be operated and managed over the next decade. This article could also provide practical guidance for policy makers charged with formulating gaming policy and regulation in other jurisdictions.

This review article is among the first to examine the new junket regulations in the Macau gaming industry. Particular emphasis is on the legal and regulatory framework governing the junket activity of gaming promoters and their associates. The recent changes to Macau gaming laws have resulted in stronger licensing requirements for local junket participants and precipitated the collapse of the VIP room system in casinos. Furthermore, this article highlights the policy and managerial implications of the current junket environment for the gaming industry in Macau and possibly other regional gaming jurisdictions. The effects of the new legal environment for Macau junkets could also provide insights into the implementation of similar legislation in other jurisdictions.

The knowledge of spatial distribution of grasshoppers can be very relevant for agricultural planning purposes. On the other hand, the comparison of spatial interpolators for efficiency and reliability reasons is also a key factor to understand interpolation maps outcomes (versus reality). At last, but not least, the use of open Web geographical tools to disseminate true spatial inferential methods to address spatial issues is still quite limited (if none) in high schools and universities, particularly in Geography subjects. If the latter can be addressed with myGeoffice©, the first issue will use the Utah, USA, dataset (58 samples) to layout the spatial distribution of grasshoppers and understand the counties that are more pro to this kind of agriculture infestation. Inverse Distance Weighted (IDW), Moving Average (MA), Multi-quadratic, Inverse Multi-quadratic and Nearest Neighbor (NN) will produce interpolated surfaces of grasshopper’s properties. Efficiency of spatial interpolators was assessed in this writing based on the prediction error’s statistics derived from the difference between the estimation and the real samples on a cross-validation procedure. Remarkably, results show that NN was the most accurate one when compared with the remaining deterministic approaches at sample’s locations.

This dissertation reports on a study which aims to add to the theoretical understanding of how social capital is transferred from one generation to the next in business families. Studies in the field of family business have emphasized the importance of succession for the survival of family businesses, but while the succession process and planning have been widely studied, the examination of social capital succession is scarce. As for the studies in family business’s social capital, the importance of social capital as a source of competitive advantage which already exists in business families have often been expressed, but there is a lack of research in the means of transferring this form of capital from the family business leaders to their successors. The study presented here addresses this gap in family business succession literature and social capital literature, explaining the means of transgenerational succession of social capital in family businesses. This is a qualitative research using the multiple case study method which aims to investigate the means of social capital transmission by comparing the cases of five different Chinese family businesses in Macau, which are in the succession process, with the successor currently managing the firm while the former generation business leaders are in the process of handing over the business and preparing for retirement. In doing so, this research offers a theoretical framework of explaining how social capital is transmitted from the incumbents to the successors throughout a five-stage succession process developed for this research. The forms of social capital that exists in family businesses are identified from previous literature, in order to clearly explain how these different forms of social capital are passed on from generation to generation based on the review on succession process introduced in published literature. A theoretical iii framework is formed from the two parent theories on family business succession and social capital, and is then verified empirically from five Chinese family businesses in Macau. The cases are developed through in-depth interviews with the incumbents and successors of the family businesses, informal interviews with stakeholders (including family members, business associates, non-family employees and customers), direct observation on the premises of the Chinese family businesses and secondary data, in order to study the process of intergenerational transmission of social capital in these Chinese family businesses

In recent years, entrepreneurship and innovation have been highly propagandised for Macau's economic development, diversification, and the Greater Bay Area (GBA). Since 2013, efforts have been exerted by the Macau government to encourage and support entrepreneurship, from the launching of the Young Entrepreneurs' Aid Scheme in 2013 and the Macau Young Entrepreneur Incubation Centre in 2015. While the failure rate of startups has been considered high in most parts of the world, the rate was only as low as 14% in Macau, with many businesses created every year. This research aims to study the unique entrepreneurial environment for small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) starting up in Macau from the experience of local entrepreneurs who are benefactors of government support. In-depth interviews were conducted to understand the experience and perceptions of these entrepreneurs as they go through each stage of the entrepreneurial process. Existing research on entrepreneurial processes varies from the two-stage process, which focuses on the beginning of an enterprise, to the different models of various stages from ideas generation to exit or long-term development. From the consolidation of the literature on the entrepreneurial process, five key stages were taken to guide this qualitative research. Findings suggested that idea validation at the start of the entrepreneurial process is almost non-existent amongst our research subjects. Yet it does not affect the implementation and growth of these SMEs. The growth strategies tend to be steady and for the long term, with most SMEs having no consideration of an exit plan.

Macao is well known for its gaming industry. However, there are also many traditional small-to-medium enterprises which are family-owned and run. There is no doubt that social capital is one of the key competitive advantages that family businesses possess, particularly when it comes to Chinese businesses with strong family values that emphasize the importance of trustworthiness and guanxi (relationships). As opposed to other forms of capital, social capital cannot be passed from one generation to another through the will of the incumbents. So, how is social capital passed on in family businesses from one generation to the next? Based on an in-depth study of five cases of successful family businesses in Macao, this research identified the forms of social capital present in business families and the succession process of these firms. From the generalizations drawn from the five cases, a theoretical framework is proposed to understand the intergenerational transmission of social capital in Chinese family businesses

Since the beginning of bilateral aid giving in the aftermath of the Second World War, the motives for aid giving have changed from being purely political and humanitarian to a mix of different interests. While poverty reduction is frequently stated as the goal of aid giving, it is commonplace for donors to use aid to advance their national interests. The rise of new, emerging donors is creating discussion in both the political and academic fields of aid giving. Traditional or western donors see emerging donors, such as China’s efforts in aid-giving as seeking the natural resources of the recipient countries. This paper provides a historical analysis of the aid-giving motivations underlying an emerging donor, China, and a traditional donor, France. The motives for China’s and France’s aid giving to African countries, with special focus on Guinea, show a great number of similarities.

In government studies, electronic government has become a hot topic in recent decades. Many scholars believe that soon, the government might not be able to operate smoothly without the help of ICTs as the Internet has been overwhelming people's daily lives already. In analyzing people's behavioral factors towards adopting e-government services, most studies targeted the adult population, while those in the hard-to-reach groups are minimal. This study was designed especially to understand the behavioral factors of the younger generation aged between 18 and 24 and the senior citizens above 60 on their adoption of e-government services in Macao SAR. Sixteen in-depth interviews were conducted based on the semi-structured interview questions developed from the prior literature on the Theory of Planned Behavior and e-government studies. Six significant findings are yielded, which could serve as an important reference for policymakers designing e-government policy and promoting its implementation strategy. These behavioral factors also contribute empirical data to support the theoretical framework of TPB in the context of Macao SAR e-government services.

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are highly associated with the study of e-government, and many scholars believe that within the coming decades, government operation and policy decision-making cannot persist without the use of ICTs (Van Dijk, 2018). This thesis aims to generate a conceptual framework of the behavioral factors that could contribute to the acceleration of the implementation of e-government services in Macao SAR. Rather than regarding e-government services as a goal to be realized in traditional practice through evaluating the outcome, a process-oriented study was conducted. The e-government services are regarded as advanced tools in the 21st century to transform Macao into a smart city. The design of the process-oriented approach and the comparative study of four groups of Macao citizens' behavioral intentions are solidly supported by the research gaps identified in the literature review of e-government studies in an international perspective and the actual context of local Macao studies. Under the framework of the Theory of Planned Behavior (Ajzen, 1985, 1991), the behavioral factors of the general public and civil servants are investigated through a qualitative approach, and the findings are triangulated from various aspects. Firstly, a systematic literature review of TPB was conducted thoroughly to better understand the current study of e-government around the world. Secondly, a content and thematic analysis of the official documents and articles from local press media and research institutes related to the topic of e-government services was carried out to demonstrate a more comprehensive picture of the current problems of implementing iv and adopting e-services in Macao SAR. Observations in some government premises that provided e-services and 40 in-depth interviews were conducted to generate detailed and first-hand data. Key issues were extracted from the interviewees’ narratives and daily actual usages. Different conceptual models for different age groups and civil servant group were formed. Special attention was paid to analyzing the "hard-to-reach" groups' behavioral intentions. Research limitations identified from the previous literature were overcome partially in this study too. After comparing the similarities and differences, a new conceptual model of significant behavioral factors that affect the behavioral intentions in adopting e-government services was built. Results and findings from the analysis could be used to develop effective interventions by the government policymakers in responding to the behavioral change of the general public in the aspect of e-government services acceptance and adoption

Electronic government is increasingly dominant in the study of public administration. In analysing people's behavioural factors towards the adoption of e-services, most previous studies targeted the adult population, while those on government employees are minimal. Government employees have an essential function in the process of government operation; they can be regarded as the principal medium of communication between the service provider (government) and the end-users (citizens). This study was designed to understand the government employees' behavioural factors on their intentions towards adopting e-government services. A set of semi-structured interview questions was developed based on the prior literature on the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) and e-government studies. Ten in-depth interviews were conducted in Macao SAR (Special Administrative Region). In addition to analysing the three primary constructs of TPB, the factor of Trust and some enablers and hindrances were identified. Significant findings were yielded while investigating how the government employees perceived the e-services and how they regarded the general public's perception of this issue. This contextualisation would help policymakers look at this issue from different perspectives and design feasible interventions according to group alignment strategies.