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Framework for integrating intelligent product structures into a flexible manufacturing system
(2023)
Increasing individualisation of products with a high variety and shorter product lifecycles result in smaller lot sizes, increasing order numbers, and rising data and information processing for manufacturing companies. To cope with these trends, integrated management of the products and manufacturing information is necessary through a “product-driven” manufacturing system. Intelligent products that are integrated as an active element within the controlling and planning of the manufacturing process can represent flexibility advantages for the system. However, there are still challenges regarding system integration and evaluation of product intel-ligence structures. In light of these trends, this paper proposes a conceptual frame-work for defining, analysing, and evaluating intelligent products using the example of an assembly system. This paper begins with a classification of the existing problems in the assembly and a definition of the intelligence level. In contrast to previous approaches, the analysis of products is expanded to five dimensions. Based on this, a structured evaluation method for a use case is presented. The structure of solving the assembly problem is provided by the use case-specific ontology model. Results are presented in terms of an assignment of different application areas, linking the problem with the target intelligence class and, depending on the intelligence class of the product, suggesting requirements for implementation. The conceptual frame-work is evaluated by utilising a case study in a learning factory. Here, the model-mix assembly is controlled actively by the workpiece carrier in terms of transferring the variant-specific work instructions to the operator and the collaborative robot (cobot) at the workstations. The resulting system thus enables better exploitation of the poten-tials through less frequent errors and shorter search times. Such an implementation has demonstrated that the intelligent workpiece carrier represents an additional part for realising a cyber-physical production system (CPPS).
Automatic content creation system for augmented reality maintenance applications for legacy machines
(2024)
Augmented reality (AR) applications have great potential to assist maintenance workers in their operations. However, creating AR solutions is time-consuming and laborious, which limits its widespread adoption in the industry. It therefore often happens that even with the latest generation machines, instead of an AR solution, the user only receives an electronic manual for the equipment operation and maintenance. This is commonplace with legacy machines. For this reason, solutions are required that simplify the creation of such AR solutions. This paper presents an approach using an electronic manual as a basis to create fast and cost-effective AR solutions for maintenance. As part of the approach, an application was developed to automatically identify and subdivide the chapters of electronic manuals via the bookmarks in the table of contents. The contents are then automatically uploaded to a central server and indexed with a suitable marker to make the data retrievable. The prepared content can then be accessed for creating context-related AR instructions via the marker. The application is characterized by the fact that no developers or experts are required to prepare the information. In addition to complying with common design criteria, the clear presentation of the contents and the intuitive use of the system offer added value for the performance of maintenance tasks. Together, these two elements form a novel way to retrofit legacy machines with AR maintenance instructions. The practical validation of the system took place in a factory environment. For this purpose, the content was created for a filter change on a CNC milling machine. The results show that inexperienced users can extract appropriate content with the software application. Furthermore, it is shown that maintenance workers, can access the content with an AR application developed for the Microsoft HoloLens 2 and complete simple tasks provided in the manufacturer's electronic manual.
Tech hubs (THs) and cognate structures are nowadays ubiquitous in the innovation ecosystem of Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries. However, the concept of THs is fuzzy due to the lack of a clear and universally accepted definition. This ambiguity is further compounded by the diverse range of organizations that self-identify as hubs, or are categorized as such by others. As a result, research on THs in SSA remained limited. Against the backdrop of established research on the interconnectedness of technology, innovation and entrepreneurship in different organizational forms, this paper is meant to provide fresh insights into the study of THs in SSA. To advance future research, first, it reveals what is special about THs in SSA and how they are related to existing concepts. I particularly argue that they contour a fourth-wave model of incubation. Second, four main categories are unfolded to delineate THs in SSA which is the cornerstone for future research.
Purpose – This paper aims to determine the affecting factors of the brand authenticity of startups in social media.
Design/methodology/approach – Using a qualitative method based on a grounded theory approach, this research specifies and classifies the affecting factors of brand authenticity of startups in social media through in-depth semi-structured interviews.
Findings – Multiple factors affecting the brand authenticity of startups in social media are determined and categorized as indexical, iconic and existential cues through this research. Connection to heritage and having credible support are determined as indexical cues. Founder intellectuality, brand intellectuality, commitment toward customers and proactive clear and interesting communications are identified as iconic cues. Having self-confidence and self-satisfaction, having intimacy with the brand and a joyful feeling for interactions with the community around the brand are determined as existential cues in this research. This research furthers previous arguments on a multiplicity of brand authenticity by shedding light on the relationship between the different aspects of authenticity and the form that different affecting factors can be organized together. Consumers eventually evaluate a strengthened perception of brand authenticity through existential cues that reflect the cues of other aspects (iconic and indexical) which passed through the goal-based assessment and self-authentication filter.
Research limitations/implications – The research sampling population can be more diversified in terms of sociodemographic attributes. Due to the qualitative methodology of this research, assessment of the findings through quantitative methods can be considered in future research. Practical implications – Using the findings of this research, startup managers can properly build a perception of authenticity in their consumers’ minds by using alternate factors while lacking major indexical cues such as heritage. This research helps startup businesses to design their brand communications better to convey their authenticity to their audiences.
Originality/value – This research determines the factors affecting the authenticity of startup brands in social media. It also defines the process of authenticity perception through different aspects of brand authenticity.
In recent years, both fields, AI and VRE, have received increasing attention in scientific research. Thus, this article’s purpose is to investigate the potential of DL-based applications on VRE and as such provide an introduction to and structured overview of the field. First, we conduct a systematic literature review of the application of Artificial Intelligence (AI), especially Deep Learning (DL), on the integration of Variable Renewable Energy (VRE). Subsequently, we provide a comprehensive overview of specific DL-based solution approaches and evaluate their applicability, including a survey of the most applied and best suited DL architectures. We identify ten DL-based approaches to support the integration of VRE in modern power systems. We find (I) solar PV and wind power generation forecasting, (II) system scheduling and grid management, and (III) intelligent condition monitoring as three high potential application areas.
Because of a high product and technology complexity, companies involve external partners in their research and development (R&D) processes. Interorganizational projects result, which represent temporary organizations. In these projects heterogenous organizations work closely together. Since project work is always teamwork, these projects face due to their characteristic’s major challenges on an organizational, relational, and content-related collaboration level. Thus, this paper raises the following research question: “How can a project team be supported on an organizational, relational, and content-related level in an interorganizational new product development setting?” To answer this research question, an explorative expert study was set up with two digital workshops using the interactive presentation tool Mentimeter. The results show that a cooperative innovation culture could support project teams on an organizational and relational level in the future in minimizing predominant problems. Moreover, it supports project teams for example in a functional communication. Furthermore, 18 values of a cooperative innovation culture result which are for example openness and transparency, risk and failure tolerance or respect. On a content-related level the results show that an adaptable tool which promotes creativity and collaboration method as well as content-related input support could be beneficial for problem-solving in an interorganizational new product development setting in the future. Because the tool can guide product developers through the process with suitable creativity and collaboration methods, can give content-related input and can enable interactive interchange on a table-top. Future research could mainly focus on the connection of the cooperative innovation culture and the tool since these potentially influence each other.
In a recently developed study programme at Reutlingen University, which focuses on practical orientations, an innovative product with solid company references is to be defined and realised by student teams. On the basis of this product, all subjects of the business engineering study programme “Sustainable Production and Business” are taught. By focusing on three main paths of future skills that have been developed by NextSkills to analyse upcoming social changes, global challenges and fields of work that are innovation-driven and agile, the new study programme aims to create responsible leaders who will shape global businesses respectfully. Thereby, different TRIZ tools help to support students in developing their own products with a focus on sustainability and pay off on the future skills enhancement. Further, students get to know TRIZ tools in an unbiased way, unburdened by too much theory, and are thus continuously supported in the progressing product development process that accompanies their studies. Hence, students perceive TRIZ on the one hand as a method to develop sustainable products and, on the other hand, to find sustainable solutions for everyday problems. The knowledge and positive experiences gained in this way should then arouse curiosity for the TRIZ class at the end of the study programme. The students can graduate with a TRIZ Level 1 certificate. Thereby, as many students as possible are introduced to the TRIZ methods, and the TRIZ tool is spread widely.
Do Chinese subordinates trust their German supervisors? A model of inter-cultural trust development
(2023)
In this qualitative study based on 95 interviews with Chinese subordinates and their German supervisors, we inductively develop a model which advances theoretical understanding by showing how inter-cultural trust development in hierarchical relationships is the result of six distinct elements: the subordinate trustor’s cultural profile (cosmopolitans, hybrids, culturally bounds), the psychological mechanisms operating within the trustor (role expectations and cultural accommodation), and contextual moderators (e.g., country context, time spent in foreign culture, and third-party influencers), which together influence the trust forms (e.g., presumptive trust, relational trust) and trust dynamics (e.g., trust breakdown and repair) within relationship phases over time (initial contact, trust continuation, trust disillusionment, separation, and acculturation). Our findings challenge the assumption that cultural differences result in low levels of initial trust and highlight the strong role the subordinate’s cultural profile can have on the dynamics and trajectory of trust in hierarchical relationships. Our model highlights that inter-cultural trust development operates as a variform universal, following the combined universalistic-particularistic paradigm in cross-cultural management, with both culturally generalizable etic dynamics, as well as culturally specific etic manifestations.
Development of an indoor positioning system to create a digital shadow of production plant layouts
(2023)
The objective of this dissertation is to develop an indoor positioning system that allows the creation of a digital shadow of the plant layout in order to continuously represent the actual state of the physical layout in the virtual space. In order to define the requirements for such a system, potential stakeholders who could benefit from a digital shadow in the context of the plant layout were analysed. In order to generate added value for their work, the requirements were derived from their perspective. As the core of an indoor positioning system is the sensory aspect to capture the physical layout parameters, different potential technologies were compared and evaluated in terms of their suitability for this particular application. Derived from this analysis, the selected concept is based on the use of a pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) camera in combination with fiducial markers. In order to determine specific camera parameters, a series of experiments were conducted which were necessary to develop the measurement method as well as the mathematical calculation method and coordinate transformation for the determination of poses (positions and angular orientations) of the respective facilities in the plant. In addition, an experimental validation was performed to ensure that the limit values for individual parameters determined in the requirements analysis can be met.
In the context of Industry 4.0, intralogistics faces an increasingly complex and dynamic environment driven by a high level of product customisation and complex manufacturing processes. One approach to deal with these changing conditions is the decentralised and intelligent connectivity of intralogistics systems. However, wireless connectivity presents a major challenge in the industry due to strict requirements such as safety and real-time data transmission. In this context, the fifth generation of mobile communications (5G) is a promising technology to meet the requirements of safety-critical applications. Particularly, since 5G offers the possibility of establishing private 5G networks, also referred to as standalone non-public networks. Through their isolation from public networks, private 5G networks provide exclusive coverage for private organisations offering them high intrinsic network control and data security. However, 5G is still under development and is being gradually introduced in a continuous release process. This process lacks transparency regarding the performance of 5G in individual releases, complicating the successful adoption of 5G as an industrial communication. Additionally, the evaluation of 5G against the specified target performance is insufficient due to the impact of the environment and external interfering factors on 5G in the industrial environment. Therefore, this paper aims to develop a technical decision-support framework that takes a holistic approach to evaluate the practicality of 5G for intralogistics use cases by considering two fundamental stages. The first of these analyses technical parameters and characteristics of the use case to evaluate the theoretical feasibility of 5G. The second stage investigates the application's environment, which substantially impacts the practicality of 5G, for instance, the influence of surrounding materials. Finally, a case study validates the proposed framework by means of an autonomous mobile robot. As a result, the validation proves the proposed framework's applicability and shows the practicality of the autonomous mobile robot, when integrating it into a private 5G network testbed.
Cyber-Physical Production Systems increasingly use semantic information to meet the grown flexibility requirements. Ontologies are often used to represent and use this semantic information. Existing systems focus on mapping knowledge and less on the exchange with other relevant IT systems (e.g., ERP systems) in which crucial semantic information, often implicit, is contained. This article presents an approach that enables the exchange of semantic information via adapters. The approach is demonstrated by a use case utilizing an MES system and an ERP system.
The Circular Economy aims to reintroduce the value of products back into the economic cycle at the same value chain level. While the activities of the Circular Economy are already well-defined, there exists a gap in how returned products are treated by the industry. This study aims to examine how a process should be designed to handle returned products in the context of the Circular Economy. To achieve this, a machine learning-based algorithm is used to classify data and extract relevant information throughout the product life cycle. The focus of this research is limited to land transportation systems within the Sharing Economy sector.
The members of the European TRIZ Campus (ETC) have been learning from and working together with many honorable members of MATRIZ Official for many years and feel very connected to the official International TRIZ Association.
To further spread the TRIZ methodology and TRIZ teaching in the European area in the past 12 months the ETC has put a lot of thought in how making TRIZ accessible to a broader audi-ence and getting more professionals in touch with the methodology was one of the focal points.
To this end, we have developed new formats such as the "Trainer Day" to support trainers on their way into practice. We have drawn up detailed quality guidelines for the teaching of the TRIZ methodology, which are intended to provide orientation for the design of training classes and docu-mentation. We strive for exchange with representatives of "neighbouring" methods such as Six sigma, Lean, DFMA and Design Thinking to indicate synergies and added value among methods and approaches of different kinds. We are testing formats for community building, in order to connect users of all places more strongly with the TRIZ methodology through communication and information of-fers. If TRIZ users feel alone in their organizations, the exchange outside their organi-zation helps them to keep up with the TRIZ methodology. Moreover, the ETC strives to increase the ability to communicate the benefits of TRIZ-usage inside organizations. We discuss, how to reach teachers and students of all age, to make them the unique way of inventive thinking accessible.
In our paper we want to give other MATRIZ Official members insights and share our experi-ences and best practices with our fellow MO members.
Why are organizations and markets slow to transform toward sustainability despite the abundant well-recognized opportunities it provides? An important subset of the phenomena this question addresses involves decision-makers recognizing the existence of opportunities but failing to undertake ambitious, effective, sufficient, or timely action. Building on existing research on capability traps, market formation, and managing sustainability, we focus on the forces con-straining organizations from developing the capabilities and market infrastructures required for sustainability transformations. We characterize types of sustainability initiatives and, using causal loop diagramming, visualize structures that enable and constrain how organizations can navigate individually and collectively worse-before-better dynamics resulting from uncertain,nonlinear, and delayed returns. Being under day-to-day pressures and deeply intertwined within their environment, organizational actors find it difficult to recognize, undertake, maintain, and coordinate necessary efforts internally and externally. We discuss research implications and directions for future research on avoiding these traps and accelerating sustainability transformations.
Cyber-Physical Production Systems increasingly use semantic information to meet the grown flexibility requirements. Ontologies are often used to represent and use this semantic information. Existing systems focus on mapping knowledge and less on the exchange with other relevant IT systems (e.g., ERP systems) in which crucial semantic information, often implicit, is contained. This article presents an approach that enables the exchange of semantic information via adapters. The approach is demonstrated by a use case utilizing an MES system and an ERP system.
The Industry 4.0 paradigm requires concepts for integrating intelligent/ smart IoT Solutions into manufacturing. Such intelligent solutions are envisioned to increase flexibility and adaptability in smart factories. Especially autonomous cobots capable of adapting to changing conditions are a key enabler for changeable factory concepts. However, identifying the requirements and solution scenarios incorporating intelligent products challenges the manufacturing industry, especially in the SME sector. In pick and place scenarios, changing coordinate systems of workpiece carriers cause placing process errors. Using the IPIDS framework, this paper describes the development of a tool-center-point positioning method to improve the process stability of a collaborative robot in a changeable assembly workstation. Applying the framework identifies the requirement for an intelligent workpiece carrier as a part of the solution. Implementing and evaluating the solution within a changeable factory validates the IPIDS framework.
Facing ever-looming climate change, studying the drivers for individuals' Information Systems (IS) Use to reduce environmental harm gains momentum. While extant research on the antecedents of sustainable IS Use has focused on specific theories, interventions, contexts, and technologies, a holistic understanding has become increasingly elusive, with a synthesis remaining absent. We employ a systematic literature review methodology to shed light on the driving antecedents for sustainable IS Use among individual consumers. Our results build on findings of 29 empirical studies drawn from 598 articles retrieved from our premier outlets and a forward/backward search. The analysis reveals six salient complementary antecedents: Relief, Empowerment, Default, User-centricity, Salience, and Encouragement. We recommend considering these concepts when developing, deploying, promoting, or regulating digital technologies to mitigate individual consumers' emissions. Along with memorable and implementable concepts, our theoretical framework offers a novel conceptualization and four promising avenues for researchers on sustainable IS Use.
Project managers still face management problems in interorganizational Research and Development (R&D) projects due to their limited authority. Addressing a project culture which is conducive to cooperation and innovation in interorganizational R&D project management demands commitment of individual project members and thus balances this limited authority. However, the relational collaboration level at which project culture manifests itself is not addressed by current project management approaches, or it is addressed only at a late stage. Consequently, project culture develops within a predefined framework of project organization and organized contents and thus is not actively targeted. Therefore, a focus shift towards project culture becomes necessary. This can be done by a project-culture-aware management. The method CLIPS actively supports interorganizational project members in this kind of management. It should be integrable in the common project management approaches, that with its application all collaboration levels are addressed in interorganizational R&D project management. The goal of this paper is to demonstrate the integrability of the method CLIPS and show how it can be integrated in common project management approaches. This enriches interorganizational R&D project management by a project culture focus.
The proliferation of smart technologies transforms the way individual consumers perform tasks. Considerable research alludes that smart technologies are often related to domestic energy consumption. However, it remains unclear how such technologies transform tasks and thereby impact our planet. We explore the role of technological smartness in personal day-to-day tasks that help create a more sustainable future. In the absence of theory, but facing extensive changes in everyday life enabled by smart technologies, we draw on phenomenon-based theorizing (PBT) guidelines. As anchor, we refer to task endogeneity related to task-technology fit theory (TTF). As infusion, we employ theory on public goods. Our model proposes novel relations between the concepts of smart autonomy and -transparency with sustainable task outcomes, mediated by task convenience and task significance. We discuss some implications, limitations, and future research opportunities.
Smart factories, driven by the integration of automation and digital technologies, have revolutionized industrial production by enhancing efficiency, productivity, and flexibility. However, the optimization and continuous improvement of these complex systems present numerous challenges, especially when real-world data collection is time-consuming, expensive, or limited. In this paper, we propose a novel method for semi-automated improvement of smart factories using synthetic data and cause-effect-relations, while incorporating the aspect of self-organization. The method leverages the power of synthetic data generation techniques to create representative datasets that mimic the behaviour of real-world manufacturing systems. These synthetic datasets serve together with the cause-and-effect relationships as a valuable resource for factory optimization, as they enable extensive experimentation and analysis without the constraints of limited or costly real-world data. Furthermore, the method embraces the concept of self organization within smart factories. By allowing the system to adapt and optimize itself based on feedback from the synthetic data, cause-effect-relationships, the factory can dynamically reconfigure and adjust its processes. To facilitate the improvement process, the method integrates the synthetic data with advanced analytics and machine learning algorithms as well as and the cause-and-effect relationships. This synergy between human expertise and technological advancements represents a compelling path towards a truly optimized smart factory of the future.
Production planning and control are characterized by unplanned events or so-called turbulences. Turbulences can be external, originating outside the company (e.g., delayed delivery by a supplier), or internal, originating within the company (e.g., failures of production and intralogistics resources). Turbulences can have far reaching consequences for companies and their customers, such as delivery delays due to process delays. For target-optimized handling of turbulences in production, forecasting methods incorporating process data in combination with the use of existing flexibility corridors of flexible production systems offer great potential. Probabilistic, data-driven forecasting methods allow determining the corresponding probabilities of potential turbulences. However, a parallel application of different forecasting methods is required to identify an appropriate one for the specific application. This requires a large database, which often is unavailable and, therefore, must be created first. A simulation-based approach to generate synthetic data is used and validated to create the necessary database of input parameters for the prediction of internal turbulences. To this end, a minimal system for conducting simulation experiments on turbulence scenarios was developed and implemented. A multi-method simulation of the minimal system synthetically generates the required process data, using agent-based modeling for the autonomously controlled system elements and event-based modeling for the stochastic turbulence events. Based on this generated synthetic data and the variation of the input parameters in the forecast, a comparative study of data-driven probabilistic forecasting methods was conducted using a data analytics tool. Forecasting methods of different types (including regression, Bayesian models, nonlinear models, decision trees, ensemble, deep learning) were analyzed in terms of prediction quality, standard deviation, and computation time. This resulted in the identification ofappropriate forecasting methods, and required input parameters for the considered turbulences.
The fifth generation of mobile communication (5G) is a wireless technology developed to provide reliable, fast data transmission for industrial applications, such as autonomous mobile robots and connect cyber-physical systems using Internet of Things (IoT) sensors. In this context, private 5G networks enable the full performance of industrial applications built on dedicated 5G infrastructures. However, emerging wireless communication technologies such as 5G are a complex and challenging topic for training in learning factories, often lacking physical or visual interaction. Therefore, this paper aims to develop a real-time performance monitoring system of private 5G networks and different industrial 5G devices to visualise the performance and impact factors influencing 5G for students and future connectivity experts. Additionally, this paper presents the first long-term measurements of private 5G networks and shows the performance gap between the actual and targeted performance of private 5G networks.
Since its first publication in 2015, the learning factory morphology has been frequently used to design new learning factories and to classify existing ones. The structuring supports the concretization of ideas and promotes exchange between stakeholders.
However, since the implementation of the first learning factories, the learning factory concept has constantly evolved.
Therefore, in the Working Group "Learning Factory Design" of the International Association of Learning Factories, the existing morphology has been revised and extended based on an analysis of the trends observed in the evolution of learning factory concepts. On the one hand, new design elements were complemented to the previous seven design dimensions, and on the other hand, new design dimensions were added. The revised version of the morphology thus provides even more targeted support in the design of new learning factories in the future.
The market for indoor positioning systems for a variety of applications has grown strongly in recent years. A wide range of systems is available, varying considerably in terms of accuracy, price and technology used. The suitability of the systems is highly dependent on the intended application. This paper presents a concept to use a single low-cost PTZ camera in combination with fiducial markers for indoor position and orientation determination. The intended use case is to capture a plant layout consisting of position, orientation and unique identity of individual facilities. Important factors to consider for the selection of a camera have been identified and the transformation of the marker pose in camera coordinates into a selectable plant coordinate system is described. The concept is illustrated by an exemplary practical implementation and its results.
The fierce market competition environment makes employees feel insecure at work. While it is difficult for enterprises to provide employees with a sense of security, they have to rely on employees’ innovative behavior to seek competitive advantage. Therefore, this study focuses on how employees engage in innovative behavior when they face job insecurity.MethodsUsing a variable-centered approach, this study aims to examine the mediating effects of intrinsic and impression management motivation in the relationship between quantitative and qualitative job insecurity and innovative behavior, including proactive and reactive innovative behavior. In addition, a person-centered approach is used to investigate whether it is possible to distinguish different combinations of quantitative and qualitative job insecurity, and examine the effect of these job insecurity profiles on motivation and innovative behavior. We used 503 data sets collected via the Credamo platform in China into the data analysis.ResultsThe study found that quantitative job insecurity affects proactive and reactive innovative behavior through impression management motivation and that qualitative job insecurity affects proactive and reactive innovative behavior through intrinsic and impression management motivation. In addition, three job insecurity profiles were identified: balanced high job insecurity, balanced low job insecurity, and a profile dominated by high quantitative job insecurity, all of which have significantly different effects on motivation and innovative behavior.DiscussionThis study contributes to provide new insights into the relationship between job insecurity and innovative behavior and compensate for the limitation of the traditional variable-centered approach that cannot capture heterogeneity within the workforce.
Mobile assistance systems (MAS) promise to overcome personnel shortages in operating theatres worldwide. A literature review inspired by the PRISMA 2020 method determines the state of the art of MAS, and identifies a lack of application areas for MAS in the operating theatre. Interviews with subject-matter experts aim to investigate application areas for MAS. The results show that most operational tasks refer to material management and patient management. MAS, with their potential to reduce the time needed for material and patient management, and the physical and mental strain of patient management, have great potential in the operating theatre.
In the past, plant layouts were regarded as highly static structures. With increasing internal and external factors causing turbulence in operations, it has become more necessary for companies to adapt to new conditions in order to maintain optimal performance. One possible way for such an adaptation is the adjustment of the plant layout by rearranging the individual facilities within the plant. Since the information about the plant layout is considered as master data and changes have a considerable impact on interconnected processes in production, it is essential that this data remains accurate and up-to-date. This paper presents a novel approach to create a digital shadow of the plant layout, which allows the actual state of the physical layout to be continuously represented in virtual space. To capture the spatial positions and orientations of the individual facilities, a pan-tilt-zoom camera in combination with fiducial markers is used. With the help of a prototypically implemented system, the real plant layout was captured and converted into different data formats for further use in exemplary external software systems. This enabled the automatic updating of the plant layout for simulation, analysis and routing tasks in a case study and showed the benefits of using the proposed system for layout capturing in terms of accuracy and effort reduction.
The increase in product variance and shorter product lifecycles result in higher production ramp-up frequencies and promote the usage of mixed-model lines. The ramp-up is considered a critical step in the product life cycle and in the automotive industry phases of the ramp-up are often executed on separated production lines (pilot lines) or factories (pilot plants) to verify processes and to qualify employees without affecting the production of other products in the mixed-model line. The required financial funds for planning and maintaining dedicated pilot lines prevent small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from the application. Hence, SMEs require different tools for piloting and training during the production ramp-up. Learning islands on which employees can be trained through induced and autonomous learning propose a solution. In this work, a concept for the development and application which contains the required organization, activities, and materials is developed through expert interviews. The results of a case study application with a medium-sized automotive manufacturer show that learning islands are a viable tool for employee qualification and process verification during the ramp-up of mixed-model lines.
Determinants of customer recovery in retail banking - lessons from a German banking case study
(2023)
Due to the increased willingness of retail banking customers to switch and churn their banking relationships, a question arises: Is it possible to win back lost customers, and if so, is such a possibility even desirable after all economic factors have been considered? To answer these questions, this paper examines selected determinants for the recovery of terminated customer–bank relationships from the perspective of former customers. This study therefore evaluates for the first time, empirically and systematically with reference to a German Sparkasse as a case-study setting, whether lost customers have a sufficient general willingness to return (GWR) a retail banking relationship. From our results, a correlation is shown between the GWR a banking relationship and some specific determinants: seeking variety, attractiveness of alternatives and customer satisfaction with the former business relationship. In addition, we show that a customer’s GWR varies depending on the reason for churn and is surprisingly greater when the customer defected for reasons that lie within the scope of the customer himself. Despite the case-study character, however, our results provide relevant insights for other banks and, in particular, this applies to countries with a comparable banking system.
The Covid-19 virus has triggered a worldwide pandemic and therefore many employees were required to work from home which caused numerous challenges. With the Covid-19 pandemic now in its third year, there are already several studies available on the subject of home offices. To investigate the impact of remote work on employee satisfaction and trust, this quantitative study aims to review existing results and formulate hypotheses based on a conceptual model created through a qualitative study and extensive literature review. The research question is as follows: Does home office during Covid-19 affect employee satisfaction and trust? To test the hypotheses, a structural equation model was constructed and analyzed. The culture of trust and flexibility are identified as the biggest influencing factors in this study.
Entrepreneurship plays a role both for the development of African countries and for foreign companies with market entry plans. The infrastructural and institutional conditions for entrepreneurship are still difficult, but the advancing digitization leads to an increasingly active start-up scene in many African countries. There is still a mismatch between the areas where start-ups are created and the areas where foreign companies are looking for partners for market entry. Thus, despite positive developments in entrepreneurship, it remains difficult to find suitable partners in the foreseeable future.
Managerial accountants spend a large part of their working time on more operational activities in cost accounting, reporting, and operational planning and budgeting. In all these areas, there has been increasing discussion in recent years, both in theory and practice, about using more digital technologies. For reporting, this means not only an intensified discussion of technologies such as RPA and AI but also more intensive changes to existing reporting systems. In particular, management information systems (MIS), which are maintained by managerial accountants and used by managers for corporate management, should be mentioned here. Based on an empirical survey in a large German company, this article discusses the requirements and assessments of users when switching from a regular MIS to a cloud-based system.
In increasingly complex production environments, tremendous efforts are being made to optimize the efficiency of a production system. An important efficiency factor is industrial maintenance, both influencing the cost and securing the technical availability of machines and components. Maintenance managers are required to deliver the necessary availability of the production system while minimizing the resources needed to do so. To make this possible, a method to evaluate the dependency between the technical availability of an entire production system and maintenance resources is necessary. This paper presents a systematic literature review of such methods is presented. In order to assess the methods proposed in the literature, first, requirements are developed, including a necessary focus on maintenance strategies within these methods. Including maintenance strategies is necessary since they provide the foundation for both the availability of a component and the maintenance resources needed. In total, 13 requirements are developed, and 21 different methods are evaluated. Only one of the proposed methods addresses all requirements, with others lacking possible combinations of maintenance strategies and the resulting influences on the production system.
AbstractThrough their procyclical behavior, loan loss provisions have been determined as one of the factors that contribute to financial instability during a crisis. IFRS 9 was introduced in 2018 with an expected credit loss model replacing the incurred loss model of IAS 39 to mitigate the effect in the future. Our study aims to analyze loan loss provisions of major banks in the Eurozone to determine for the first time if the implementation of IFRS 9, as intended by regulators, has a dampening effect on procyclicality, especially during the stressed situation under COVID‐19. We analyze 51 banks from 12 countries of the European Monetary Union using 2856 firm‐year observations. While no robust evidence of less procyclicality can be found after the implementation of IFRS 9 until the pandemic, we find evidence that loan loss provisions moved countercyclical during 2020, indicating an alleviating effect at the beginning of the exogenous shock.
Development of an IoT-based inventory management solution and training module using smart bins
(2023)
Flexibility, transparency and changeability of warehouse environments are playing an increasingly important role to achieve a cost-efficient production of small batch sizes. This results in increasing requirements for warehouses in terms of flexibility, scalability, reconfigurability and transparency of material and information flows to deal with large number of different components and variable material and information flows due to small batch sizes. Therefore, an IoT-based inventory management solution and training module has been developed, implemented and validated at Werk150 – the Factory on campus of the ESB Business School. Key elements of the developed solution are smart bins using weight mats to track the bin’s content and additional sensors and buttons which are connected to an IoT – Hub to collect data of material consumption and manual handling operations. The use of weight mats for the smart bins offers the possibility to measure the container content independent of the specific component geometry and thus for a variety of components based on the specific component weights. The developed solution enables focusing on key for success elements of the system to provide synchronization of the flow of materials and information resulting an increase of flexibility and significantly higher transparency of the material flow. AIbased algorithms are applied to analyse the gathered data and to initiate process optimizations by providing the logistics decision makers a profound and transparent basis for decision making. In order to provide students and industry visitors of the learning factory with the necessary competences and to support the transfer into practice, a training module on IoT-based inventory management was developed and implemented.
Circular economy aims to support reuse and extends the product life cycles through repair, remanufacturing, upgrades and retrofits, as well as closing material cycles through recycling. To successfully manage the necessary transformation processes to circular economy, manufacturing enterprises rely on the competency of their employees. The definition of competency requirements for circular economy-oriented production networks will contribute to the operationalization of circular economy. The International Association of Learning Factories (IALF) statesin its mission the development of learning systems addressing these challenges for training of students and further education of industry employees. To identify the required competencies for circular economy, the major changes of the product life cycle phases have been investigated based on the state of the science and compared to the socio-technical infrastructure and thematic fields of the learning factories considered in this paper. To operationalize the circular economy approach in the product design and production phase in learning factories, an approach for a cross learning factory network (so called "Cross Learning Factory Product Production System (CLFPPS)") has been developed. The proposed CLFPPS represents a network on the design dimensions of learning factories. This approach contributes to the promotion of circular economy in learning factories as it makes use of and combines the focus areas of different learning factories. This enables the CLFPPS to offer a holistic view on the product life cycle in production networks.
The world is becoming increasingly digital. People have become used to learning and interacting with the world around them through technology, accelerated even further by the Covid-19 pandemic. This is especially relevant to the generation currently entering education systems and the workforce. Considering digital aids and methods of learning are important for future learning. The increasing online learning needs open the case for integrating digital learning aspects such as serious gaming within education and training systems. Learning factories fall amongst the education and training systems that can benefit from integration with digital learning extensions. Digital capabilities such as digital twins and models further enable the exploration of integrating digital serious games as an extension of learning factories. Since learning factories are meant for a range of different learning, training, and research purposes, such serious games need to be adaptable across stakeholder perspectives to maximize the value gained from the time and cost invested into such design and development. Research into the development of adaptive serious games for multiple stakeholder perspectives must first determine whether such development can be developed that reaches the objectives set for different included stakeholder perspectives. The purpose of this research is to investigate this at the hand of the practical development of a digital adaptive serious game for stakeholder perspectives.
Product engineering and subsequent phases of product lifecycles are predominantly managed in isolation. Companies therefore do not fully exploit potentials through using data from smart factories and product usage. The novel intelligent and integrated Product Lifecycle Management (i²PLM) describes an approach that uses these data for product engineering. This paper describes the i²PLM, shows the cause-and-effect relationships in this context and presents in detail the validation of the approach. The i²PLM is applied and validated on a smart product in an industrial research environment. Here, the subsequent generation of a smart lunchbox is developed based on production and sensor data. The results of the validation give indications for further improvements of the i²PLM. This paper describes how to integrate the i²PLM into a learning factory.
Supply chains have evolved into dynamic, interconnected supply networks, which increases the complexity of achieving end-to-end traceability of object flows and their experienced events. With its capability to ensure a secure, transparent, and immutable environment without relying on a trusted third party, the emerging blockchain technology shows strong potential to enable end-to-end traceability in such complex multitiered supply networks. However, as the dissertation’s systematic literature review reveals, the currently available blockchain-based traceability solutions lack the ability to map object-related supply chain events holistically, which involves mapping objects’ creation and deletion, aggregation and disaggregation, transformation, and transaction. Therefore, this dissertation proposes a novel blockchain-based traceability architecture that integrates governance and token concepts to overcome the limitations of existing architectures. While the governance concept manages the supply chain structure on an application level, the token concept includes all functions to conduct object-related supply chain events. For this to be possible, this dissertation’s token concept introduces token ‘blueprints’, which allow clients to group tokens into different types, where tokens of the same type are non-fungible. Furthermore, blueprints can include minting conditions, which are, for example, necessary when mapping assembly or delivery processes. In addition, the token concept contains logic for reflecting all conducted object-related events in an integrated token history. This ultimately leads to end-to-end traceability of tokens and their physical or abstract representatives on the blockchain. For validation purposes, this dissertation implements the architecture’s components and their update and request relationships in code and proves its applicability based on the Ethereum blockchain. Finally, this dissertation provides a scenario-based evaluation based on two industrial case studies from a manufacturing and logistics perspective to validate the architecture’s capabilities when applied in real-world industrial settings. The proposed blockchain-based traceability architecture thus covers all object-related supply chain events derived from the two industrial case studies and therefore proves its general-purpose end-to-end traceability capabilities of object flows.
Military organizations have special features like following different organizational laws in times of peace and war and their specific embeddedness in society and politics. Especially the latter aspect has made the military an important object of study since the beginnings of modern sociology. In the wake of establishing specific sociological accounts, military sociology has been developed, dedicated to the different facets of the military. This research is based on different theoretical perspectives, but has hardly embraced the frameworks from economics and sociology of conventions (EC/SC) so far. The aim of the chapter is to explore and demonstrate the potentials of this approach. In a first step, the state of the art of military sociology research is outlined, and potential avenues for analyzing military forces based on EC/SC are identified. It is argued that especially the connection to organizational theory (military as organization) and civil-military relations, including leadership and professionalism, offer starting points. After introducing existing studies addressing military-related topics with reference to EC/SC, relevant concepts and approaches of convention theory that prove to be particularly enriching for military research are discussed. An outlook on possible further fields and topics of research is given to concretize how an inclusion of the perspective of EC/SC could look like.
Global trade is plagued by slow and inefficient manual processes associated with physical documents. Firms are constantly looking for new ways to improve transparency and increase the resilience of their supply chains. This can be solved by the digitalisation of supply chains and the automation of document- and information-sharing processes. Blockchain is touted as a solution to these issues due to its unique combination of features, such as immutability, decentralisation and transparency. A lack of business cases that quantify the costs and benefits causes uncertainty regarding the truth of these claims. This paper explores how the costs and benefits of a blockchain-based solution for digitalising and automating documentation flows in cross-border supply chains compare to a conventional centralised relational database solution. The research described in this paper uses primary data collected through semi-structured interviews with industry experts, as well as secondary data from literature. Two models based on existing services were developed and the costs and benefits compared and then analysed using the Architecture Trade-off Analysis Method (ATAM) and the Analytic Network Process (ANP). Findings from the analysis show that a consortium blockchain solution like TradeLens is the favourable solution for digitalising and automating information flows in cross-border supply chains.
The paper “focuses on the critique of economic rationality” (p. 2). The author analyses the work by Amartya Sen with a somewhat interdisciplinary approach. The author concludes that Sen has greatly shifted our paradigm of economic rationality. The nexus of ethics and economics as well as the two types of rationality (consistency versus optimization) are major contributions of Sen, according to the author. In a nutshell, Sen’s work is reconfiguring economic rationality until today.
The aim of this article is to establish a stochastic search algorithm for neural networks based on the fractional stochastic processes {𝐵𝐻𝑡,𝑡≥0} with the Hurst parameter 𝐻∈(0,1). We define and discuss the properties of fractional stochastic processes, {𝐵𝐻𝑡,𝑡≥0}, which generalize a standard Brownian motion. Fractional stochastic processes capture useful yet different properties in order to simulate real-world phenomena. This approach provides new insights to stochastic gradient descent (SGD) algorithms in machine learning. We exhibit convergence properties for fractional stochastic processes.
Governments and public institutions increasingly embrace digital opportunities to involve citizens in public issues and decision making. While public participation is generally seen as an important and promising venture, the design of the participation processes and the utilized digital infrastructure poses challenges, especially to the public sector. Instead of limiting conceptual guidance and exchange to one domain, we therefore develop a taxonomy for digital involvement projects that unites the domains of e-participation, citizen science and crowd-X. Embedded in a design science research approach, we follow an iterative design process to elaborate the key characteristics of a digital involvement project based on the participation process, its individuals and digital infrastructure. Through evaluating the artifact in a focus group with domain practitioners, we find support for the usefulness of our taxonomy and its ability to provide guidance and a basis for discussion of digital involvement projects across domains.
Most digital innovations fail when they transition from the exploring to the scaling stage. We describe how freeyou, the digital innovation spinoff of a major German insurer, successfully scaled online-only car insurance, focusing particularly on how it managed the IT-related challenges. The stark differences between the stages required very different approaches to application development, IT organization and data analytics. Based on freeyou’s experience, we provide recommendations for successful transitioning from exploring to scaling.
Twitter and citations
(2023)
Social media, especially Twitter, plays an increasingly important role among researchers in showcasing and promoting their research. Does Twitter affect academic citations? Making use of Twitter activity about columns published on VoxEU, a renowned online platform for economists, we develop an instrumental variable strategy to show that Twitter activity about a research paper has a causal effect on the number of citations that this paper will receive. We find that the existence of at least one tweet, as opposed to none, increases citations by 16-25%. Doubling overall Twitter engagement boosts citations by up to 16%.
The 17 SDGs, as agreed upon by the international community, are designed to be implemented across all levels of human activity. Alongside the level of international politics, this also includes the local levels, national politics, wider society, and the economic sphere. Many channels are called on to further implementation, including the transfer of technology to developing and emerging countries. As the patent holders, this must include the active participation of companies. While the literature examines the important role of technology transfer in North-South business-to-business (B2B) partnerships, studies on the technology transfer between European and African companies are scarce. Therefore, in this study we use original data from 26 interviews conducted with managers engaged in sales partnerships between German manufacturers and their distributors in African markets to examine the existence and forms of technology transfer. We find that training and marketing excellence are the predominant forms of technology transfer and based on that suggest a refinement of established frameworks on B2B technology transfer.
Towards a sustainable future, looking beyond the system boundaries of a single manufacturing company is necessary to promote meaningful collaborations in terms of circular economy principles. In this context digital data processing technologies to connect the potential collaborators are seen as enablers to make use of proven collaborative circular business models (CCBMs). Since most of such data processing technologies rely on features to describe the entities involved, it is essential to provide guidance for identifying and selecting the relevant and most appropriate ones. Defining critical success factors (CSFs) is considered a suitable instrument to describe the decisive factors. A systematic literature review (SLR), followed by a qualitative synthesis is investigating two scientific fields of work, namely (1) the general relevant features of CCBMs and, (2) methodologies for determining CSFs. This results in the development of a conceptual framework which provides guidance for digital applications that perform further digital processing based on the relevant CSFs relating to the specific CCBM.
Machine failures’ consequences – a classification model considering ultra-efficiency criteria
(2023)
To strive for a sustainable production, maintenance has to evaluate possible machine failure consequences not just economically but also holistically. Approaches such as the ultra-efficiency factory consider energy, material, human/staff, emission, and organization as optimization dimensions. These ultra-efficiency dimensions can be considered for analyzing not only the respective machine failure but also the effects on the entire production system holistically. This paper presents an easy to use method, based on a questionnaire, for assessing the failure consequences of a machine malfunction in a production system considering the ultra-efficiency dimensions. The method was validated in a battery production.
Using predictive maintenance, more efficient processes can be implemented, leading to fewer maintenance costs and increased availability. The development of a predictive maintenance solution currently requires high efforts in time and capacity as well as often interdisciplinary cooperation. This paper presents a standardized model to describe a predictive maintenance use case. The description model is used to collect, present, and document the required information for the implementation of predictive maintenance use cases by and for different stakeholders. Based on this model, predictive maintenance solutions can be introduced more efficiently. The method is validated across departments in the automotive sector.
The increasing complexity and need for availability of automated guided vehicles (AGVs) pose challenges to companies, leading to a focus on new maintenance strategies. In this paper, a smart maintenance architecture based on a digital twin is presented to optimize the technical and economic effectiveness of AGV maintenance activities. To realize this, a literature review was conducted to identify the necessary requirements for Smart Maintenance and Digital Twins. The identified requirements were combined into modules and then integrated into an architecture. The architecture was evaluated on a real AGV on the battery as one of the critical components.
Condition monitoring supported with artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and industrial internet of things (IIoT) technologies increases the feasibility of predictive maintenance. However, the cost of traditional sensors, data acquisition systems, and the required information technology expert-knowledge challenge the industry. This paper presents a hybrid condition monitoring system (CMS) architecture consisting of a distributed, low-cost IIoT-sensor solution. The CMS uses micro-electro-mechanical system (MEMS) microphones for data acquisition, edge computing for signal preprocessing, and cloud computing, including artificial neural networks (ANN) for higher-level information processing. The system's feasibility is validated using a testbed for reciprocating linear-motion axes.
This study examines the underexplored areas of customer success management, focusing on the impact of leadership and companywide collaboration, and the role of customer success in overall firm performance. A qualitative research approach was utilized, which involved reviewing relevant literature and conducting an interview with the Vice President of Customer Success Management in B2B at a case company. Findings revealed that both leadership and pervasive collaboration greatly enhance the customer journey experience. Given that 75% of Annual Recurring Revenue is derived from existing customers, the substantial role of customer success in propelling business growth is affirmed. The study also demonstrated the importance of proactive customer engagement, assimilating customer feedback into products and services, and nurturing personal relationships with customers for fostering innovation. It further stressed the need for service provision and decision-making at various levels, as well as the implementation of a range of communication channels, to ensure customer success.
This study examines the phenomenon of Virtual Influencer (VI) marketing and its impact on customer purchase behavior. The aim is to understand the scope and impact of VI marketing. The study compares VI marketing to traditional Human Influencer (HI) marketing and identifies the unique benefits and challenges associated with VIs. A survey was conducted to gain insight into consumer attitudes and behaviors toward VIs. Key findings reveal varying levels of trust and acceptance of VIs among consumers. While some participants expressed openness to buying products promoted by VIs, others had reservations about their authenticity. The study also explores the potential role of VIs in the metaverse, highlighting business opportunities and challenges in this evolving digital landscape. Overall, this research sheds light on the growing influence of VIs and the need for further research in the field of marketing.
The dawn of the 21st Century has witnessed a tremendous increase in trade pacts among nations, resulting in renewed hopes for sustainable enterprise development in emerging economies worldwide. Ghana and other sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries have signed onto several North-South and South-South free trade agreements with the hope of strengthening their presence in the international trade arena, and to promote economic growth in SSA. For over two decades, however, very little has changed, and many have dashed their high hopes as enterprises continue to struggle in SSA. Not even the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) could renew the hopes of sceptics. Several studies opined that enterprises in SSA could improve their domestic and international competitiveness by establishing mutually beneficial partnerships with their counterparts from the Global North and South. This study delved into the issues that affect North-South and South-South business collaborations and recommends key success factors that could help promote mutually beneficial cross-border business partnerships. The research includes both literature and empirical information on the key success factors of business partnerships between African enterprises as well as between African enterprises and firms from the Global North. We approached the study qualitatively using a phenomenological research design. Research participants included important stakeholders in Africa and Europe's international trade and sustainable enterprise development ecosystem. The study identified several challenges with the current business collaborations and recommended new ways of making such partnerships more beneficial.
Purpose
Job advertisements are important means of communicating role expectations for management accountants to the labor market. They provide information about which roles are sought and expected. However, which roles are communicated in job advertisements is unknown so far.
Design/methodology/approach
With a text-mining approach on a large sample of 889 job ads, the authors extract information on roles, type of firm and hierarchical position of the management accountant sought.
Findings
The results indicate an apparent mix of different role types with a strong focus on a classic watchdog role. However, the business partner role is more often sought for leadership positions or in family businesses and small- and medium-sized enterprises (SME).
Research limitations/implications
The main limitation is the lack of an agreed-upon measurement instrument for roles in job offers. The study results imply that corporate practice is not as theory-driven as is postulated and communicated in the management accounting community. This indicates the existence of a research-practice gap and tensions between different actors in the management accounting field.
Practical implications
The results challenge the current role discussion of professional organizations for management accountants as business partners.
Originality/value
The authors contribute the first study, which explicitly analyzes the communication of roles in job offers for management accountants. It indicates a discrepancy between scholarly discussion on roles and management accountants' work from an employer's perspective.
Purpose – This paper explores, which employer attractiveness attributes Generation Z (Gen Z) talents prioritize. Comparing the findings for female and male participants, this study examines whether gender-specific work value orientations prevail among Gen Z talents and impact their expectations toward employers.
Design/methodology/approach – A survey was conducted among 308 students of business, economics and management in Germany. Data were collected using the employer attractiveness scale of Berthon and colleagues (2005) complemented by an additional dimension focusing on work–life balance.
Findings – Findings indicate that Gen Z talents primarily expect a fun work environment, a positive team atmosphere and supportive relations with colleagues and superiors. Application aspects and work–life balance enabling services are expected the least. Expectations of four of the six attributes measured differ significantly among women and men, indicating that traditional gender assumptions continue to be reflected in the work value orientations of Gen Z talents.
Research limitations/implications – The sample was limited to business, economics and management students in Germany. Additional research should include a wider variety of respondents of different disciplines and countries.
Practical implications – Practical implications refer to emphasizing the social value of employment in the employee value proposition and customizing employer branding activities by gender.
Originality/value – This study contributes to the literature by empirically determining which employer attractiveness attributes Gen Z talents expect and whether and how these expectations vary by gender.
Customer orientation should be the core engine of every organisation. Information technology can be considered as the enabler to generate competitive advantages through customer processes in marketing, sales and service. The impact of information technologies is the biggest risk and at the same time a huge opportunity for any organisation. Research shows that Customer Relationship Management (CRM) enables organisations to perform better and focus more on their customers (e.g. market capitalisation of Amazon). While global enterprises are shaping the future of customer centricity and information technology, the question arises how German B2B organisations can shift their value contribution from product-centric to customer-centric. Therefore, these organisations are attempting to implement CRM software and putting their customers more into focus. However, the question remains, how organisations are approaching the implementation of CRM and if these attempts are paying off in terms of business performance.
Contributing to this highly topical discussion, this thesis contributes to the body of knowledge about the implementation of CRM in the German B2B sector and how it impacts their business performance. First, theoretical frameworks have been developed based on an extensive literature review. Hereby different aspects of CRM are worked-out and mapped against three dimensions of business performance, namely process efficiency, customer satisfaction and financial performance. Based on the theory, a conceptual framework was developed to test the relationships between CRM and Business Performance (BP). Therefore, a survey with 500 participants has been conducted. Based on this a measurement model was developed to test five main hypotheses.
The findings of these hypotheses suggest, that the implementation of CRM positively impacts business performance. In specific, the usage of analytical CRM and the establishment of a dedicated CRM success measurement correlate with the performance of German B2B organisations. In addition to these main findings, various key statements could be derived from the research and a measurement model was developed, which can be used for different organisational characteristics assessing BP. As a result, CRM implementations can be enhanced, and business performance can be improved.
The blockchain technology represents a decentralised database that stores information securely in immutable data blocks. Regarding supply chain management, these characteristics offer potentials in increasing supply chain transparency, visibility, automation, and efficiency. In this context, first token-based mapping approaches exist to transfer certain manufacturing processes to the blockchain, such as the creation or assembly of parts as well as their transfer of ownership. This paper proposes a prototypical blockchain application that adopts an authority concept and a concept of smart non-fungible tokens. The application enables the mapping of complex products in dynamic supply chains that require the auditability of changeable assembling processes on the blockchain. Finally, the paper demonstrates the practical feasibility of the proposed application based on a prototypical implementation created on the Ethereum blockchain.
The fifth mobile communications generation (5G) can lead to a substantial change in companies enabling the full capability of wireless industrial communication. 5G with its key features of providing Enhanced Mobile Broadband, Ultra-Reliable and Low-Latency Communication, and Massive Machine Type Communication will support the implementation of Industry 4.0 applications. In particular, the possibility to set-up Non-Public Networks provides the opportunity of 5G communication in factories and ensures sole access to the 5G infrastructure offering new opportunities for companies to implement innovative mobile applications. Currently there exist various concepts, ideas, and projects for 5G applications in an industrial environment. However, the global rollout of 5G systems is a continuous process based on various stages defined by the global initiative 3rd Generation Partnership Project that develops and specifies the 5G telecommunication standard. Accordingly, some services are currently still far from their final performance capability or not yet implemented. Additionally, research lacks in clarifying the general suitability of 5G regarding frequently mentioned 5G use cases. This paper aims to identify relevant 5G use cases for intralogistics and evaluates their technical requirements regarding their practical feasibility throughout the upcoming 5G specifications.
Purpose
The authors study the valuation effect of corporate diversification in the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 in Europe.
Design/methodology/approach
Applying a cross-sectional regression model to a sample of public companies headquartered in the European Union, the authors investigate the existence of and the change in a diversification discount between 2018 and 2020. By applying the Excess Q methodology, the authors make an industry adjustment of diversified companies to measure the value effect of corporate diversification.
Findings
The authors find an economically and statistically significant diversification discount that increases from an average Excess Q of −0.05 in 2019 to −0.10 in 2020. The diversified companies' inferior fundamental financial performance in 2020 accompanies the discount. The results deviate from those of previous research, which mostly show a decrease in the diversification discount in economic crises, and thereby, shed doubt on whether diversification provides insurance against pandemic-induced adverse value effects.
Originality/valueThe study distinguishes the role of corporate diversification during recessionary periods by establishing that the valuation effect of diversification depends on the nature of the crisis. The analysis incorporates criticism of previous studies concerning a biased methodology and uniform data source by applying the Excess Q methodology and using FactSet industry segment data.
Supply chains have evolved into dynamic, interconnected supply networks, which increases the complexity of achieving end-to-end traceability of object flows and their experienced events. With its capability of ensuring a secure, transparent, and immutable environment without relying on a trusted third party, the emerging blockchain technology shows strong potential to enable end-to-end traceability in such complex multitiered supply networks. This paper aims to overcome the limitations of existing blockchain-based traceability architectures regarding their object-related event mapping ability, which involves mapping the creation and deletion of objects, their aggregation and disaggregation, transformation, and transaction, in one holistic architecture. Therefore, this paper proposes a novel ‘blueprint-based’ token concept, which allows clients to group tokens into different types, where tokens of the same type are non-fungible. Furthermore, blueprints can include minting conditions, which, for example, are necessary when mapping assembly processes. In addition, the token concept contains logic for reflecting all conducted object-related events in an integrated token history. Finally, for validation purposes, this article implements the architecture’s components in code and proves its applicability based on the Ethereum blockchain. As a result, the proposed blockchain-based traceability architecture covers all object-related supply chain events and proves its general-purpose end-to-end traceability capabilities of object flows.
Academic research is vital for innovation and industrial growth. However, a potential burden of processing ever more knowledge could be affecting research output and researchers’ careers. We look at a dataset of researchers who have published in journals in the field of economics during a period of 45 years. For a subset of these researchers, we amass data from journals listed in the EconLit database, supplemented with years of birth from public sources. Our results show an increase in the age of researchers at their first publication, in the number of articles referenced in debut articles, and in the number of co-authors. Simultaneously, we observe a decline in the probability of researchers changing research fields. Our findings extend earlier findings on patents and hint at a burden of knowledge pervading different areas of human progress. Moreover, our results indicate that researchers develop strategies of specialisation to deal with this challenge.
COVID-19 and educational inequality: How school closures affect low- and high-achieving students
(2021)
In spring 2020, governments around the globe shut down schools to mitigate the spread of the novel coronavirus. We argue that low-achieving students may be particularly affected by the lack of educator support during school closures. We collect detailed time-use information on students before and during the school closures in a survey of 1099 parents in Germany. We find that while students on average reduced their daily learning time of 7.4 h by about half, the reduction was significantly larger for low-achievers (4.1 h) than for high-achievers (3.7 h). Low-achievers disproportionately replaced learning time with detrimental activities such as TV or computer games rather than with activities more conducive to child development. The learning gap was not compensated by parents or schools who provided less support for low-achieving students.
This paper presents a description model for smart, connected devices used in a manufacturing context. Similar to the wide spread adoption of smart products for personal and private usage, recent developments lead to a plethora of devices offering a variety of features and capabilities. Manufacturing companies undergoing digital transformation demand guidance with respect to the systematic introduction of smart, connected devices. The introduction of smart connected devices constitutes a strategic decision cost due to the high future committed cost after introduction and maintaining a smart device fleet by a vendor. This paper aims to support the introduction efforts by classifying the devices and thus helping companies identify their specific requirements for smart, connected devices before initiating widespread procurement. By mapping the features of these devices based on various attributes, allows the clustering of smart, connected devices including a requirement list for their implementation on the shopfloor. Four individual commercially available smart connected devices were analyzed using the description model.
Parallel grippers offer multiple applications thanks to their flexibility. Their application field ranges from aerospace and automotive to medicine and communication technologies. However, the application of grippers has the problem of exhibition wear and errors during the execution of their operation. This affects the performance of the gripper. In this context, the remaining useful life (RUL) defines the remaining lifespan until failure for an asset at a particular time of operation occurs. The exact lifespan of an asset is uncertain, thus the RUL model and estimation must be derived from available sources of information. This paper presents a method for the estimation of the RUL for a two-jaw parallel gripper. After the introduction to the topic, an overview of existing literature and RUL methods are presented. Subsequently, the method for estimating the RUL of grippers is explained. Finally, the results are summarized and discussed before the outlook and further challenges are presented.
The aim of this paper is to show to what extent Artificial Intelligence can be used to optimize forecasting capability in procurement as well as to compare AI with traditional statistic methods. At the same time this article presents the status quo of the research project ANIMATE. The project applies Artificial Intelligence to forecast customer orders in medium-sized companies.
Precise forecasts are essential for companies. For planning, decision making and controlling. Forecasts are applied, e.g. in the areas of supply chain, production or purchasing. Medium-sized companies have major challenges in using suitable methods to improve their forecasting ability.
Companies often use proven methods such as classical statistics as the ARIMA algorithm. However, simple statistics often fail while applied for complex non-linear predictions.
Initial results show that even a simple MLP ANN produces better results than traditional statistic methods. Furthermore, a baseline (Implicit Sales Expectation) of the company was used to compare the performance. This comparison also shows that the proposed AI method is superior.
Until the developed method becomes part of corporate practice, it must be further optimized. The model has difficulties with strong declines, for example due to holidays. The authors are certain that the model can be further improved. For example, through more advanced methods, such as a FilterNet, but also through more data, such as external data on holiday periods.
We study whether compulsory religious education in schools affects students' religiosity as adults. We exploit the staggered termination of compulsory religious education across German states in models with state and cohort fixed effects. Using three different datasets, we find that abolishing compulsory religious education significantly reduced religiosity of affected students in adulthood. It also reduced the religious actions of personal prayer, church-going, and church membership. Beyond religious attitudes, the reform led to more equalized gender roles, fewer marriages and children, and higher labor-market participation and earnings. The reform did not affect ethical and political values or non-religious school outcomes.
We study whether compulsory religious education in schools affects students' religiosity as adults. We exploit the staggered termination of compulsory religious education across German states in models with state and cohort fixed effects. Using three different datasets, we find that abolishing compulsory religious education significantly reduced religiosity of affected students in adulthood. It also reduced the religious actions of personal prayer, church-going, and church membership. Beyond religious attitudes, the reform led to more equalized gender roles, fewer marriages and children, and higher labor-market participation and earnings. The reform did not affect ethical and political values or non-religious school outcomes.
Being exposed to compulsory religious education in school can have long-run consequences for students’ lives. At different points in time since the 1970s, German states terminated compulsory religious education in public schools and replaced it by a choice between ethics classes and religious education. This article shows that the reform not only led to reduced religiosity in students’ later life, but also eroded traditional attitudes towards gender roles and increased labor-market participation and earnings.
Gender pay gaps are commonly studied in populations with already completed educational careers. We focus on an earlier stage by investigating the gender pay gap among university students working alongside their studies. With data from five cohorts of a large-scale student survey from Germany, we use regression and wage decomposition techniques to describe gender pay gaps and potential explanations. We find that female students earn about 6% less on average than male students, which reduces to 4.1% when accounting for a rich set of explanatory variables. The largest explanatory factor is the type of jobs male and female students pursue.
With the digital transformation, companies will experience a change that focuses on shaping the organization into an agile organizational form. In today's competitive and fast-moving business environment, it is necessary to react quickly to changing market conditions. Agility represents a promising option for overcoming these challenges. The path to an agile organization represents a development process that requires consideration of countless levels of the enterprise. This paper examines the impact of digital transformation on agile working practices and the benefits that can be achieved through technology. To enable a solution for today's so-called VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity und Ambiguity) world, agile ways of working can be applied project management requires adaptation. In the qualitative study, expert interviews were conducted and analyzed using the grounded theory method. As a result, a model can be presented that shows the influencing factors and potentials of agile management in the context of the digital transformation of medium-sized companies.
Industrial practice is characterized by random events, also referred to as internal and external turbulences, which disturb the target-oriented planning and execution of production and logistics processes. Methods of probabilistic forecasting, in contrast to single value predictions, allow an estimation of the probability of various future outcomes of a random variable in the form of a probability density function instead of predicting the probability of a specific single outcome. Probabilistic forecasting methods, which are embedded into the analytics process to gain insights for the future based on historical data, therefore offer great potential for incorporating uncertainty into planning and control in industrial environments. In order to familiarize students with these potentials, a training module on the application of probabilistic forecasting methods in production and intralogistics was developed in the learning factory 'Werk150' of the ESB Business School (Reutlingen University). The theoretical introduction to the topic of analytics, probabilistic forecasting methods and the transition to the application domain of intralogistics is done based on examples from other disciplines such as weather forecasting and energy consumption forecasting. In addition, data sets of the learning factory are used to familiarize the students with the steps of the analytics process in a practice-oriented manner. After this, the students are given the task of identifying the influencing factors and required information to capture intralogistics turbulences based on defined turbulence scenarios (e.g. failure of a logistical resource) in the learning factory. Within practical production scenario runs, the students apply probabilistic forecasting using and comparing different probabilistic forecasting methods. The graduate training module allows the students to experience the potentials of using probabilistic forecasting methods to improve production and intralogistics processes in context with turbulences and to build up corresponding professional and methodological competencies.
Advancements in Internet of Things (IoT), cloud and mobile computing have fostered the digital enrichment—or “digitization”—of physical products, which are gaining increasing relevance in practice. According to recent studies, global IoT spending will exceed USD 1 Trillion by 2021 and there will be over 25 billion IoT connections (KPMG, 2018). Porter and Heppelmann (2014) state that IT is “revolutionizing products [as …] IT is becoming an integral part of the product itself.” Senior business executives like GE’s former CEO Jeff Immelt (2015) are even proposing that “every industrial company in the coming age is also going to become a software and analytics company.” This reflects the increasing relevance of IT components’ (i.e., software, data analytics, cloud computing) integration into previously purely physical products. We call IT-enriched physical products, “digitized” products to differentiate them from purely intangible “digital” products, such as digital music, e-books, and software. Examples of digitized products include the Philips Hue smartphone-controllable lightbulb, Audi Connect internet-connected cars, or Rolls-Royce’s sensor-enabled pay per use jet engines.
Digitized products provide their producers with a wide range of opportunities to offer new functionality and product capabilities (e.g., autonomy) that traditional, physical products do not exhibit (Porter and Heppelmann, 2014). In addition, the digitization of products allows producers to continuously repurpose their offerings, by extending and/or changing the product functionality and, thus, enabling new value creation opportunities. Based on their re-programmability and connectivity, digitized products “remain essentially incomplete […] throughout their lifetime as users continue to add and delete […] and change […] functional capabilities” (Yoo, 2013). For instance, the Philips Hue connected lightbulb enables remote control of basic functions (e.g., switching on and off the light) as well as setting more advanced light scenes for day-to-day tasks (e.g., relax, read) via Amazon’s Alexa artificial intelligence assistant (Signify, 2019), offerings that were not intended use cases when Signify (previously known as Philips Lighting) created Hue in 2012. Thus, digitized products present limitless potentials for new functionality and unforeseen use cases, which provides them with a huge innovation capacity.
Despite the limitless potentials offered by digitized products, there has been a slow uptake of digitized products by businesses so far (Jernigan et al., 2016; Mocker et al., 2019). According to a 2016 MIT Sloan Management Review report (Jernigan et al., 2016) only 24% of the investigated firms were actively using IoT technologies – a key technology for digitized products. In a more recent research study Mocker et al. (2019) found that the median revenue share from digital offerings (i.e., solutions based on IT enriched products) in large companies only accounted for 5% of the total revenue of the investigated companies.
The slow uptake of digitized products might be explained by the challenges that firms face regarding the changing nature of digitized products. Pervasive digital technologies (such as IoT) change the nature of products by adding new functionality that was previously not part of the value proposition of the products/services (e.g., a pair of shoes embedded with sensors and connectivity allows joggers to have access to data regarding their run distance, speed, etc.) (Yoo et al., 2012). The addition of new functionality and use cases of digitized products makes it harder for producers to design and develop relevant products (Hui 2014). As described in the paper ‘Do Your Customers Actually Want a “Smart” Version of Your Product?’, “just because [firms] can make something with IoT technology doesn’t mean people will want it.” (Smith, 2017).
The shift in digitized products’ nature poses new challenges for producers along the entire product development process (Porter and Heppelmann, 2015; Yoo et al., 2012) and create a paradox in product digitization, described by Yoo et al. (2012) as the paradox of pace: while technology accelerates the rate of innovation, companies need to spend more time to digitize their products, extending time to market. The production of these digitized products also becomes more challenging, e.g., as companies need to deal with different clock-speeds of software and hardware development (Porter and Heppelman, 2015). The above-mentioned challenges suggest that producers need to better understand how they can generate value from their digitized products’ generative potentials.
The body of literature on digitized products has been growing in recent years. For instance, Herterich et al. (2016) investigate how digitized product affordances (i.e., potentials) enable industrial service innovation; Nicolescu et al. (2018) explore the emerging meanings of value associated with IoT; and Benbunan-Fich (2019) studies the impact of basic wearable sensors on the quality of the user experience. However, it remains unclear what it takes for firms to generate value with their digitized product potentials. This dissertation investigates this research gap.
Job advertisements are important means of communicating role expectations for management accountants to the labor market. They provide information about which roles of management accountants are sought by companies or which roles are expected. However, which roles are communicated in job advertisements is unknown so far. Using a large sample of 889 job ads and a text-mining approach, we show an apparent mix of different role types with a strong focus on a rather classic role: the watchdog role. However, individuals with business partner characteristics are more often sought for leadership positions or in family businesses and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The results challenge the current role discussion for management accountants as business partners in practice and some academic fields.
This research briefing describes the organizational capability of scaling at scale, which we define as enabling multiple digital innovation initiatives to realize bottom-line value from their innovation by leveraging shared resources. We illustrate this concept with a case study from global multi-energy company Repsol, which implemented scaling at scale to cultivate a portfolio of more than 450 initiatives and helped over seventy percent of initiatives to reach the scale-up stage. As a result, over five years Repsol realized €800 million of bottom-line value from digital innovations.
To generate greater value faster from digital innovation, many companies are increasing how much they learn from their own innovation efforts. However, in many companies, these changes are limited to one stakeholder group: innovation teams. Two other stakeholder groups, senior executives and experts from corporate functions, also need to learn from digital innovation initiatives. We have defined three learning imperatives that address a company’s needs to learn continually about building (1) a successful innovation, (2) a portfolio of initiatives that realizes strategic objectives faster, and (3) shared resources that propel multiple initiatives. All three imperatives involve collecting data regularly from digital innovation initiatives. In this research briefing we outline the three learning imperatives and provide examples of how companies are pursuing them to achieve strategic objectives more effectively and efficiently.
Artificial intelligence is considered to be a significant technology for driving the future evolution of smart manufacturing environments. At the same time, automated guided vehicles (AGVs) play an essential role in manufacturing systems due to their potential to improve internal logistics by increasing production flexibility. Thereby, the productivity of the entire system relies on the quality of the schedule, which can achieve production cost savings by minimizing delays and the total makespan. However, traditional scheduling algorithms often have difficulties in adapting to changing environment conditions, and the performance of a selected algorithm depends on the individual scheduling problem. Therefore, this paper aimed to analyze the scheduling problem classes of AGVs by applying design science research to develop an algorithm selection approach. The designed artifact addressed a catalogue of characteristics that used several machine learning algorithms to find the optimal solution strategy for the intended scheduling problem. The contribution of this paper is the creation of an algorithm selection method that automatically selects a scheduling algorithm, depending on the problem class and the algorithm space. In this way, production efficiency can be increased by dynamically adapting the AGV schedules. A computational study with benchmark literature instances unveiled the successful implementation of constraint programming solvers for solving JSSP and FJSSP scheduling problems and machine learning algorithms for predicting the most promising solver. The performance of the solvers strongly depended on the given problem class and the problem instance. Consequently, the overall production performance increased by selecting the algorithms per instance. A field experiment in the learning factory at Reutlingen University enabled the validation of the approach within a running production scenario.
Especially, if the potential of technical and organizational measures for ergonomic workplace design is limited, exoskeletons can be considered as innovative ergonomic aids to reduce the physical workload of workers. Recent scientific findings from ergonomic analyses with and without exoskeletons are indicating that strain reduction can be achieved, particularly at workplaces with lifting, holding, and carrying processes. Currently, a work system design method is under development incorporating criteria and characteristics for the design of work systems in which a human worker is supported by an exoskeleton. Based on the properties of common passive and active exoskeletons, factors influencing the human on which an exoskeleton can have a positive or negative effect (e.g. additional weight) were derived. The method will be validated by the conceptualization and setup of several work system demonstrators at Werk150, the factory of ESB Business School on campus of Reutlingen University, to prove the positive ergonomic effect on humans and the supporting process to choose the suitable exoskeleton. The developed method and demonstrators enable the user to experience the positive ergonomic effects of exoskeletal support in lifting, holding and carrying processes in logistics and production. The new work system design method will contribute to the fact that employees can pursue their professional activity longer without substantial injuries or can be used more flexibly at different work stations. Also new work concepts, strategies and scenarios are opened up to reduce the risk of occupational accidents and to promote the compatibility of work for employees. A training module is being developed and evaluated with participants from industry and master students to build up competence.
The early involvement of experiences gained through intelligence and data analysis is becoming increasingly important in order to develop new products, leading to a completely different conception of product creation, development and engineering processes using the advantages that the dedication of the digital twin entails. Introducing a novel stage gate process in order to be holistically anchored in learning factories adopting idea generation and idea screening in an early stage, beta testing of first prototypes, technical implementation in real production scenarios, business analysis, market evaluation, pricing, service models as well as innovative social media portals. Corresponding product modelling in the sense of sustainability, circular economy, and data analytics forecasts the product on the market both before and after market launch with the interlinking of data interpretation nearby in real-time. The digital twin represents the link between the digital model and the digital shadow. Additionally, the connection of the digital twin with the product provides constantly updated operating status and process data as well as mapping of technical properties and real-world behaviours. A future-networking product, by embedded information technology with the ability to initiate and carry out one's own further development, is able to interact with people and environments and thus is relevant to the way of life of future generations. In today's development work for this new product creation approach, on one hand, "Werk150" is the object of the development itself and on the other hand the validation environment. In the next step, new learning modules and scenarios for trainings at master level will be derived from these findings.
Moral change and the purchase-sales-relationship: critical analysis of German and Swiss companies
(2022)
This study examines the awareness and causes of moral change from the economic perspective in Germany and Switzerland. Based on an analysis of value research to date and interviews with experts in B2B sales, the manifestations of moral change are critically examined and recommendations for action are derived on an employee-specific and company-wide level.
Process risks are omnipresent in the corporate world and repeatedly present organizations with the challenge of how to deal with these risks. Efforts in trying to analyze and prevent these risks are costly and require many resources, which do not always bring the desired added value. The goal of this work is to determine how a benefit-oriented resource allocation can be made for risk-oriented process management. For this purpose, the following research question is posed: "How can systematic prioritization decisions regarding risk-oriented process management be made?” To answer it, an evaluation procedure is developed which assesses processes based on their characteristics regarding potential risk disposition as well as entrepreneurial relevance. For this purpose, requirements for such a procedure are first collected and used to define selection criteria for it. After the detailed analysis of known selection and evaluation procedures, one of them is selected and used for further development. Next steps include the definition of relevant criteria for the evaluation of the processes by examining process characteristics regarding their suitability for process evaluation. The focus here lies on characteristics that provide indications of the risk disposition and business relevance of processes. The result of this approach is a scoring model with a criteria catalog consisting of 15 criteria according to which a process is evaluated. The evaluation result is presented both numerically and in a matrix. This enables the comparison of several processes and a derived prioritization of those for a more in-depth risk analysis. The application of this approach will ensure a benefit-oriented allocation of resources in the management of process risks and increased process reliability.
For some time now, eSports has complemented the portfolio of many sponsors in sports. Though partnerships with important organizations, brands are gaining a foothold in the eSports landscape. While the communication work with media and fans in the framework of conventional sports has been tried and tested for many years, Public Relations (PR) in eSports is new for companies. The paper examines the requirements of PR in eSports. These are identified by analyzing a quantitative survey among eSports fans. The results prove the existance of significant differences in the requirements of successful PR in eSports. The differences are mainly based on the different target groups and their media usage behavoir. Classic formats such as TV or print are ignored by eSport fans. This influences the choice of media partners for sponsors. Successful PR in eSports requires patience and long-term planning. It is important to maintain a close exchange with partners in order to jointly design attractive formats for media and their consumers.
Will chatbots play a significant role for B2B marketingin the future? Chatbots in B2B businesses
(2022)
Digitalization has gained a foothold in our everyday lives. However, it remains to be seen what digital tools B2B companies can benefit from. During the last few years, chatbots have been on the rise and have played a more significant role in B2B marketing. Thus, this research follows a literature review to examine the current state of B2B chatbots. With this, the study will discover the buyer’s preferences for chatbots compared to sales agents and the role of chatbots in different stages of the B2B sales funnel.
This article aims to give an overview of what German business needs in current times. By illustrating the Made in Germany label as a perceived image in sales, specific attributes are being evaluated to explain better the challenges German businesses are currently facing: Digitization, Education, Environment, and Quality & China.
Production systems are becoming increasingly complex, which means that the main task of industrial maintenance, ensuring the technical availability of a production system, is also becoming increasingly difficult. The previous focus of maintenance efforts on individual machines must give way to a holistic view encompassing the whole production system. Against this background, the technical availability of a production system must be redefined. The aim of this publication is to present different definition approaches of production systems’ availability and to demonstrate the effects of random machine failures on the key figures considering the complexity of the production system using a discrete event simulation.
The aim of this work is to establish and generalize a relationship between fractional partial differential equations (fPDEs) and stochastic differential equations (SDEs) to a wider class of stochastic processes, including fractional Brownian motions and sub-fractional Brownian motions with Hurst parameter H ∈ (1/2,1). We start by establishing the connection between a fPDE and SDE via the Feynman-Kac Theorem, which provides a stochastic representation of a general Cauchy problem. In hindsight, we extend this connection by assuming SDEs with fractional and sub-fractional Brownian motions and prove the generalized Feynman-Kac formulas under a (sub-)fractional Brownian motion. An application of the theorem demonstrates, as a by-product, the solution of a fractional integral, which has relevance in probability theory.
The time has come : application of artificial intelligence in small- and medium-sized enterprises
(2022)
Artificial intelligence (AI) is not yet widely used in small- and medium-sized industrial enterprises (SME). The reasons for this are manifold and range from not understanding use cases, not enough trained employees, to too little data. This article presents a successful design-oriented case study at a medium-sized company, where the described reasons are present. In this study, future demand forecasts are generated based on historical demand data for products at a material number level using a gradient boosting machine (GBM). An improvement of 15% on the status quo (i.e. based on the root mean squared error) could be achieved with rather simple techniques. Hence, the motivation, the method, and the first results are presented. Concluding challenges, from which practical users should derive learning experiences and impulses for their own projects, are addressed.
Demand forecasting intermittent time series is a challenging business problem. Companies have difficulties in forecasting this particular form of demand pattern. On the one hand, it is characterized by many non-demand periods and therefore classical statistical forecasting algorithms, such as ARIMA, only work to a limited extent. On the other hand, companies often cannot meet the requirements for good forecasting models, such as providing sufficient training data. The recent major advances of artificial intelligence in applications are largely based on transfer learning. In this paper, we investigate whether this method, originating from computer vision, can improve the forecasting quality of intermittent demand time series using deep learning models. Our empirical results show that, in total, transfer learning can reduce the mean square error by 65 percent. We also show that especially short (65 percent reduction) and medium long (91 percent reduction) time series benefit from this approach.
The purpose of this paper sought to develop a collaborative framework that provides wine bottling facilities, wine cellars and their direct supply chain partner guidelines to facilitate a collaborative partnership – aiming to aid responsive decision making and improve reliability. The framework was developed using a triangulation approach, consisting of an in-depth literature review, 14 semi-structured interviews with industry experts and a theoretical case study. The developed framework was presented to wine bottling facilities and their supply chain stakeholders. Indication are that the proposed wine industry collaborative framework should enhance supply chain collaboration and will contribute towards the guidance and facilitation in developing collaboration platforms to align supply chain operations, while improving bottling responsiveness and meeting demand requirements.
Rational behavior is a standard assumption in science. Indeed, rationality is required for environmental action towards net-zero emissions or public health interventions during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Yet, little is known about the elements of rationality. This paper explores a dualism of rationality comprised of optimality and consistency. By designing a new guessing game, we experimentally uncover and disentangle two building blocks of human rationality: the notions of optimality and consistency. We find evidence that rationality is largely associated to optimality and weakly to consistency. Remarkably, under uncertainty, rationality gradually shifts to a heuristic notion. Our findings provide insights to better understand human decision making.
An empirical study on management accountants’ roles and role perceptions: a German perspective
(2022)
The ongoing discussion on roles of management accountants (MAs) leads often to perceive the business partner (BP) role as the role of choice. Yet, many scholars and practitioners seem to assume that this role is clear to managers and MAs, that it makes sense for them and that all managers and MAs agree on it and implement it. Inconsistencies between actual roles, perceived, and expected roles might cause identity and role conflicts. However, we lack evidence of whether managers and MAs perceive, expect and act in the BP role and if tensions and conflicts might exist. This paper is based on a quantitative empirical study of a large German high-tech firm in 2019 whose top management decided to implement the BP role. We found several areas of tension in this role discussion and contribute to the literature on MAs’ roles with a more nuanced view of the interaction between managers and MAs regarding MAs’ roles. The study shows that there are mainly differences in business managers’ expectations of MAs to the role of the BP, which the MAs do not know exactly how to fulfill.
Due to the growing importance of videos for B2B sales outreach, this study proposes an extended model based on the Corporate-Video Model by Büsching and Meidel (2016) and a qualitative survey with high-ranking company representatives. The findings comprise seven complementary categories: structure, communication, product display, information content, unique selling proposition, value-based selling, and dramaturgy of product videos. The model extension aids practitioners in analyzing and conceptualizing compelling B2B product videos.
The usage of webinars is witnessing a resurgence in popularity, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic. It is now revealing itself to be an actual shift in how buyers and sellers do business in the future. Therefore, this study aims to investigate whether webinars will continue to be a valuable tool in B2B sales in the future. Specifically, it aims to gain a deeper understanding of how the role of webinars evolved in recent years and analyze its future potential.
Webinars are an essential tool for a wide variety of different use cases. While they have been around for over a decade, webinars recently have seen a resurgence in popularity. As the COVID-19 pandemic strictly limited contact between people and made them work from home as an only option, hosting and participating in webinars has become more common than ever - whether in business, education, or leisure.
Webinars can be effective for various purposes as they are held in real-time and allow multiple engagement opportunities between attendees and hosts. Moreover, because of their remote nature, webinars are more cost-effective and time-saving in organizing and supervising. Consequently, it is cheaper and more convenient to reach your desired target group as a webinar host than to hold a seminar in physical form. Among other reasons, convenience and interaction seem to be the most potent aspects of cementing webinars as a tool in the digital world. Nevertheless, where exactly are they used, and how do they create value in their respective usage fields?
The imparting of knowledge and skills in STEM education, especially under the influence of the Covid-19 pandemic, is increasingly taking place online and through digital formats. The partially asynchronous instruction eliminates, on the one hand, the social relation in the learning process and, on the other hand, the direct experience with physical objects. Here, the digital learning systems provide learning tools and controls to support the learning process on a general basis. Existing methods for simulating physical objects (digital twins) are also used to a minimal extent. The following approach presents a learning system framework that enables individualized learning, including all dimensions (social, physical). Implementing a concept that uses a personalized assistance system to orchestrate the individual learning steps enables efficient and effective learning. Applying the learning system framework exemplifies the STEM education at Reutlingen University in the logistics learning factory Werk150.
Purpose
This field study aims to investigate the interactive relationships of millennial employee’s gender, supervisor’s gender and country culture on the conflict-management strategies (CMS) in ten countries (USA, China, Turkey, Germany, Bangladesh, Portugal, Pakistan, Italy, Thailand and Hong Kong).
Design/methodology/approach
This exploratory study extends past research by examining the interactive effects of gender × supervisor’s gender × country on the CMS within a single generation of workers, millennials. The Rahim Organizational Conflict Inventory–II, Form A was used to assess the use of the five CMS (integrating, obliging, dominating, avoiding and compromising). Data analysis found CMS used in the workplace are associated with the interaction of worker and supervisor genders and the national context of their work.
Findings
Data analysis (N = 2,801) was performed using the multivariate analysis of covariance with work experience as a covariate. The analysis provided support for the three-way interaction. This interaction suggests how one uses the CMS depends on self-gender, supervisor’s gender and the country where the parties live. Also, the covariate – work experience – was significantly associated with CMS.
Research limitations/implications
One of the limitations of this study is that the authors collected data from a collegiate sample of employed management students in ten countries. There are significant implications for leading global teams and training programs for mid-level millennials.
Practical implications
There are various conflict situations where one conflict strategy may be more appropriate than others. Organizations may have to change their policies for recruiting employees who are more effective in conflict management.
Social implications
Conflict management is not only important for managers but it is also important for all human beings. Individuals handle conflict every day and it would be really good if they could handle it effectively and improve their gains.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no study has tested a three-way interaction of variables on CMS. This study has a wealth of information on CMS for global managers.
Customer Success Management is the next evolution in complex sales that drives growth. Moreover, Customer Success Management is a modern holistic sales philosophy and part of a professional customer experience management strategy. The following conceptual paper discusses fundamental thoughts based on value-based selling, customer success focus, and a clear view on a perspective beyond selling that will gain importance in the future.
In the current age of innovative business financing opportunities available from fintech apps, social media crowdfunding sites such as Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and RocketHub, et.al., and friends and family private equity investors, start-up firms can strategically source their venture capital funds from many globally disperse organizations and individuals. As the firm in this case learned, the benefit of alternative investing sources comes with a critical hidden risk for corporate governance. After a financial restructuring, a typical Silicon Valley software start-up found itself with close to 300 external individual shareholders, some of whom had not been documented as accredited investors. The regulatory agency could decide that the prior actions of the founders and the decisions of the board had been prejudicial to the interests of the minority investors. The management of this small private company faced an atypical investor relations dilemma, before its initial public offering (IPO).
Social commerce
(2022)
The concept of “social commerce” refers to a synthesis of e-commerce and social media. Despite the rapid growth in users of and revenues from social commerce, so far little in-depth research has been conducted in Germany on this topic. The goal here, therefore, is to conduct schematic research of the literature and an online survey of German consumers to analyze the potential opportunities for companies.