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John Davis on Sports Sponsorship and Branding: "The Olympic Games Effect"
Marketing professor John Davis is director of the Centre for Marketing Excellence at the Singapore Management University.In his new book, The Olympic Games Effect, to be published by John Wiley in the run up to the Beijing Olympics, Davis examines why companies and even host cities and countries invest so heavily in sports sponsorship and branding. He also offers valuable lessons -- drawn from a rich collection of real-lfe examples -- on the risks involved, and how to maximise returns from these investments should businesses decide to go down this route.

Knowledge@SMU Jul 04 - Aug 04

Lien Centre’s "Social Space" Turns the Spotlight on Social Enterprise and Innovation
The Lien Centre of the Singapore Management University was set up in 2006 with support from the Lien Foundation to serve as a catalyst for social innovation and change in Singapore. The Centre will launch an inaugural volume, Social Space, in August 2008. Lien Centre Board Chairman, Willie Cheng, talked to Knowledge@SMU about the book, the overall aims of the centre, and his own thinking on social enterprise, innovation and entrepreneurship. Cheng was formerly country managing director for Accenture and is actively involved in the nonprofit sector in Singapore.

How to Stand Out in the Crowd? Innovate, Innovate, Innovate.
In the world of marketing and branding, sticking out like a sore thumb is not necessarily a bad thing, advises brand innovation specialist Chandran Dharmarajan, co-founder of I-morph, a marketing innovation consultancy based in Singapore. Dharmarajan, who worked for over a decade with Unilever in India and Thailand followed by a stint with Kraft Foods Asia Pacific, spoke at a seminar, “Transform Your Business By Being Remarkable”, organised by the UOB-SMU Alliance Centre of the Singapore Management University.

Book Review: Anna-Katharina Hornidge Compares Singapore and Germany in “The Knowledge Society”
An international think tank at the forefront of critical reflections about the rise of knowledge is the research group on Culture, Knowledge and Development at the Centre for Development Policy (ZEF), University of Bonn, Germany. Anna-Katharina Hornidge is senior researcher at ZEF. Her book, The Knowledge Society -- Vision and Social Construction of Reality in Germany and Singapore, edited by Solvay Gerke and Hans-Dieter Evers and published in 2007, is reviewed by Thomas Menkhoff, professor of organisational behaviour at the Lee Kong Chian School of Business, Singapore Management University.

Herd Behaviour in Financial Markets: Do Traders Follow the Crowd or Do Their Own Thing?
In financial markets, what part of a trader’s action is simply “following the crowd” or herding, and how much is based on the trader’s own information? Herding has been shown to decrease the stability and efficiency of markets, hence the interest in these behaviours. Marco Cipriani (Asian Division, IMF Institute) and Antonio Guarino (University College London) studied herd behaviour in a laboratory setting involving financial market professionals. Cipriani presented a co-authored IMF working paper on herd behaviour in financial markets at a recent seminar at the Singapore Management University.

Can Poverty Maps Direct Development Aid More Effectively to the Neediest?
Developing countries face many difficulties with targeting poverty alleviation programs towards people who need help the most. Often, detailed and accurate information is not readily available, and governments could end up in a double-bind – of distributing resources to individuals not in urgent need of assistance while excluding the poorest of the poor. Singapore Management University economics professor Tomoko Fujii was one of five international researchers who concluded that using ‘poverty maps’ combined with fine geographic targeting can deliver promising results.