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Large bodied freshwater fishes can be important target species for recreational anglers, with some species introduced intentionally to diversify angling experiences. European barbel Barbus barbus is an important target species in many riverine fisheries, including the River Severn and its River Teme tributary, western England, where it has supported a catch-and-release recreational fishery for approximately 50 years. The River Teme was renowned for the quality of its barbel angling from the 1980s. Since 2007, angler dissatisfaction has increased substantially in this fishery, being associated with alleged declines in the number of barbel being captured and in their population abundances. As there were few data available at that time to investigate these declines, data from periodic electric fishing surveys and some angler catch data were sourced. Analyses revealed temporal declines in the number of sampled barbel during electric fishing surveys, although the number of surveys was low, varied between years and did not target barbel specifically. Analyses of four angler catch data sets (1995–2022) involving more than 1000 captured barbel of 0.5–5.3 kg also revealed significant temporal declines in barbel catches (by number and catch-per-unit-effort). These catch declines were generally coincident with reductions in angler presence and effort on the river, suggesting low catches were a driver of angler dissatisfaction. These results provide empirical support for angler claims of substantial declines in barbel catches and abundances, and emphasise that even limited volumes of angler catch data are useful for understanding temporal changes in exploited but data limited fish populations.

This article examines two unexpectedly successful latecomer firms which emerged from Argentina, a crisis ridden developing economy where the vast majority of firms have languished behind the technology frontier set by global leaders. By comparing the experience of these two unusual firms with that of general trends among successful, mainly Asian latecomers, we hope to throw light on the opportunities facing other firms struggling under adverse economic and policy conditions. Through appreciative theorising we aim to incorporate some ideas from evolutionary economic theory to hopefully extend ‘normal’ (mainly Asian based) latecomer catch-up conceptualisation. The empirical findings, based on a unique and original dataset, suggest that in order to catch-up with global competitors the two latecomer firms were forced to develop strong entrepreneurial capabilities to follow a ‘contrarian path’ in terms of corporate strategy, organizational structures and technological and management capabilities, when policy incentives and macroeconomic conditions pointed them in the opposite direction. The article introduces a new framework to analyse latecomers within the macroeconomic and policy context and raises questions for future latecomer theory, policy and research on latecomer firms’ strategies under adversity.

While the effects of proximity on the technological catch-up of emerging economy firms are well documented, little is known about how the sub-dimensions of cross-national distance impact such firms' acquisition of foreign IP. Cross-national distance is a complex, multi-dimensional construct that has the potential to influence catch-up in different ways, especially for Chinese firms. We use the established Wharton indicators of cross-national distance (Berry et al., 2010) to understand foreign IP acquisition by Chinese firms over a 10-year period. Results show: (1) different sub-dimensions of distance have different direct effects on foreign IP acquisition, (2) a positive effect of knowledge distance on IP acquisition interacts with three other forms of distance, (3) the most aggressive foreign IP acquisition strategies are linked to only three forms of distance, and (4) the impact of disaggregated distance depends on IP asset type and whether the acquirer is in manufacturing or services. Results provide new insight into China's technological catch-up and the complex, multi-dimensional nature of international proximity influencing technological catch-up through acquisitions.

Ultrasonic logging is a widely used technology to assess the cement bond condition in a cased-hole. Advanced ultrasonic pitch-catch measurements can capture reflections at the cement-formation interface (in short, the third interface echo [TIE]), which enables the evaluation of the bond condition, casing eccentering, and the velocity of the material in the cement annulus. However, the usage is limited by the TIE arrival picking due to the low amplitude that results from the eccentered tool and casing, overlapping with the tool-casing multiple reflections, as well as interference from the primary zero-order antisymmetric Lamb wave (A0). We develop a two-step method to enhance and accurately pick the TIE arrivals. We first use mathematical morphological filtering with a neural network framework to mitigate the influence of A0. Then, we use the local window multichannel singular-spectrum analysis to suppress the effect of tool-casing multiples on the TIE. In the second step, we develop a sinusoidal search method with a path postcorrection algorithm to track the TIE arrivals from the enhanced TIE waveforms automatically. Synthetic and field data results show that our TIE processing can effectively eliminate the A0 mode and suppress tool-casing multiples. In addition, the picked TIE arrivals are consistent with actual TIE curves.

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