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Business process management and IT supported processes are an actual topic. The procedure of finding a business process system that implements your processes the best way is not easy and takes a lot of time. In this article you will find a recommendation for an open source system. Four selected open source workflow management systems are tested and analyzed. Mean criteria for the evaluation are listed in a criteria catalogue and rated by experts by their importance. Finally, the systems are evaluated by the criteria and the best evaluated system can be recommended.
Wasted paradise – imagining the Maldives without the garbage island of Thilafushi : Version 1.2
(2016)
To address the high level of waste production in the Maldives, the local government decided to transform the coral island of Thilafushi into an immense waste dumb in 1992. Meanwhile, each day, 330 tons of waste is ferried to Thilafushi. The policy had the positive consequence of relieving the garbage burden in Malé, the main island, and surrounding tourist atolls. However, it can also lead to serious environmental and economic damage in the long range. First, the garbage is in visual range of one of the most prominent tourist destinations. Second, if the wind blows a certain way, unfiltered fumes from burning waste travels to tourist atolls. Third, water quality can erode as hazardous waste from batteries and other toxic waste is floating in the ocean. Over time, these effects can accumulate to significantly hamper the number of tourists that travel to the Maldives – one of the state’s main sources of financial income. In our paper, we lay out the situation in more detail and translate it into a simulation model. We test different policies to propose the Maldives government how to better solve the waste problem.
During the first years of their employment, the graduates are a liability to industry. The employer goes an extra mile to bridge the gap between university-exiting and profitable employment of engineering graduates. Unfortunately some cannot take this risk. Given this scenario, this paper presents a learning factory approach as a platform for the application of knowledge so as to develop the required engineering competences in South African engineering graduates before they enter the labour market. It spells out the components of a Stellenbosch University Learning Factory geared towards production of engineering graduates with the required industrial skills. It elaborates on the didactics embedded in the learning factory environment, tailor-made to produce engineers who can productively contribute to the growth of the industry upon exiting the university.
In a recent publication Novy-Marx (2013) finds evidence that the variable gross profitability has a strong statistical influence on the common variation of stock returns. He also points out that there is common variation in stock returns related to firm profitability that is not captured by the three-factor model of Fama and French (1993). Thus, this thesis augments the three-factor model by the factor gross profitability and examines whether a profitability-based four-factor model is able to better explain monthly portfolio excess returns on the German stock market compared to the three-factor model of Fama and French (1993) and the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM). Based on monthly stock returns of the CDAX over the period July 2008 to June 2014 this thesis documents four main findings. First, a significant positive market risk premium and a significant positive value premium can be identified. No evidence is found for a size or a profitability effect. Second, all included factors have a strong significant effect on monthly portfolio excess returns. Third, the four-factor model clearly outperforms both the three-factor model of Fama and French (1993) and the CAPM in capturing the common variation in monthly portfolio excess returns. The CAPM performs worst. Finally, the results indicate that the three-factor model of Fama and French (1993) is somewhat better in explaining the cross-section of portfolio excess returns than the four-factor model. Again, the CAPM performs worst. Nevertheless, the four-factor model is considered to be an improvement over the three-factor model of Fama and French (1993) and the CAPM in determining stock returns on the German stock market.
Systemic Constellation describes an approach that enables practitioners to examine and address typical issues in diversity management from a different, relational perspective. Systemic Constellation utilizes the human ability to recognize the qualities of relationships between two or more people from their spatial alignment to each other (transverbal language) and the capability to illustrate inner pictures by placing humans or objects in a room as representatives (representative perception). Systemic Constellation originated in the field of family therapy and counseling, but through research, guidance work, and teaching activities over the last two decades, it has developed into a generic, structural, constellation logic with multiple methods of application. It has been adapted to a variety of topics and issues, and a number of constellation formats. This article serves as a starting point for the transfer of Systemic Constellation into diversity management. It appears that conventional approaches taught in traditional management classes (such as focusing on tools, setting targets, planning measures, and offering incentives) are of limited use when trying to deal with problematic situations in diversity management. Preliminary trials show that new solutions and insights into deeper underlying dynamics can be gained on personal and institutional levels when applying Systemic Constellation. Participants find the application of the model as very beneficial. Systemic Constellation is grounded in personal experience and particularly in a person’s own experience of the consistency of representative perception. This viewpoint can only be conveyed rudimentarily in a scientific article. Readers should feel encouraged to apply Systemic Constellations themselves and use it in their work, experimentally and professionally. To harness the full potential of Systemic Constellations in diversity management, further research needs to be done.
Sport marketing is the specific application of marketing principles and processes to sports products and services. In 2014 the biggest sports event in the world, the FIFA World Cup, took place in Brazil. Billions of spectators around the world saw Germany win the trophy in Rio de Janeiro for the fourth time in history. Yet unlike in previous World Cups, conversation was not only taking place at the numerous public viewings which were held in open spaces like bars and restaurants. For the entire tournament social media like Facebook or Twitter were playing a dominant role in all aspects. With 672 million tweets on Twitter and three billion conversations on Facebook, this was the most social World Cup as well as the most social mega sports event so far. It did not matter whether it were users, athletes or companies, everyone was trying to catch up on the conversation to be informed or inform others about their opinion or latest news. This paper analyzes the implementation of social media marketing during mega sports events with a focus on Adidas’ and Nike’s social media campaigns in the frame of the FIFA World Cup 2014 in Brazil. The analysis shows that social media marketing in the frame of mega sports events gains importance. Those companies finding topics that affect people personally with a relationship to their products achieve success through social media marketing.
As long as there have been professional sports, there have been relationships on different levels. For example, sponsorship (or patronage as it was called in the early days) was mostly based on personal relations between the local benefactors and their favourite sports club. Regarding media, clubs always maintained special relationships with selected journalists. The bond between fans and their clubs was always a close and mutually beneficial one. All these relationships existed from the start of the sports business. Therefore, relationship marketing is nothing new in the context of sports. Many sporting organisations always knew to value a deep and good relationship with their stakeholders and practised relationship marketing without being aware of it. Successful sports managers, however, take the old wisdom and turn it into a modern relationship marketing approach by structuring the various relationships in order to make them more effective and profitable for the own sporting organisation and the various stakeholders. This chapter ... illustrates the many facets of relationship marketing and the possibilities it offers in the context of the sports business.
Due to the complexity of assembly processes, a high ratio of tasks is still performed by human workers. Short-cyclically changing work contents due to smaller lot sizes, especially the varied series assesmbly, increases both the need for information support as well as the risk of rising physical and psychological stress. The use of technical and digital assistance systems can counter these challenges. Through the integration of information and communication technology as well as collaborative assembly technologies, hybrid cyber-physical assembly systems will emerge. Widely established assembly planning approaches for digital and technical support systems in cyber physical assembly systems will be outlined and discussed with regard to synergies and delimitations of planning perspectives.
This article discusses the scientifically and industrially important problem of automating the process of unloading goods from standard shipping containers. We outline some of the challenges barring further adoption of robotic solutions to this problem, ranging from handling a vast variety of shapes, sizes, weights, appearances, and packing arrangements of the goods, through hard demands on unloading speed and reliability, to ensuring that fragile goods are not damaged. We propose a modular and reconfigurable software framework in an attempt to efficiently address some of these challenges. We also outline the general framework design and the basic functionality of the core modules developed. We present two instantiations of the software system on two different fully integrated demonstrators: 1) coping with an industrial scenario, i.e., the automated unloading of coffee sacks with an already economically interesting performance; and 2) a scenario used to demonstrate the capabilities of our scientific and technological developments in the context of medium- to long-term prospects of automation in logistics. We performed evaluations that allowed us to summarize several important lessons learned and to identify future directions of research on autonomous robots for the handling of goods in logistics applications.
This paper analyzes different government debt relief programs in the European Monetary Union. I build a model and study different options ranging from debt relief to the European Stability Mechanism (ESM). The analysis reveals the following: First, patient countries repay debt, while impatient countries more likely consume and default. Second, without ESM loans, indebted countries default anyway. Third, if the probability to be an impatient government is high, then the supply of loans is constrained. In general, sustainable and unsustainable governments should be incentivized differently especially in a supranational monetary union. Finally, I develop policy recommendations for the ongoing debate in the Eurozone.
The MIT Center for Information Systems Research surveyed 255 executives in 2015 to investigate how companies are managing business complexity. This report details the findings from our analysis of the survey data:
1. Some product complexity adds value, some does not. Specifically, companies with more links (aka integration) in their product and service portfolio are higher performing. - 2. Product variety makes it more difficult for costumers and employees to get things done. These customers and employee difficulties impair a company's performance. - 3. Companies that excel at making it easy for employees and customers to get things done differentiate themselves by applying a set of complexity management practices around enterprise architecture, role reconfiguration, and the use of metrics and incentive systems.
Based on these findings, we recommend that companies make product complexity a strategic chois, invest in the abovementioned complexity management practices, and use costumer and employee dfficulties as key metrics for product innovation.
The digital economy has created intense demands for innovations. Companies are responding in part by creating new digital products and services to meet increasing customer expectations.
MIT CISR findings indicate that product variety is NOT directly related to firm performance, and IS related to increased difficulties for costumers and employees.
Management and cost accounting has been the basic toolbox in business administration for decades. Today it is an integral part of all curricula in business education and no student can afford not to be familiar with its basic concepts and instruments. At the same time, business in general, and management accounting in particular, is becoming more and more international. English clearly has evolved as the „lingua franca“ of international business. Academics, students as well as practitioners exchange their views and ideas, discuss concepts and communicate with each other in English. This is certainly also true for cost accounting and management accounting.
The paper studies liquidity management in the banking sector at the zero lower bound implemented by central banks. The new era of monetary policy with interest rates at zero and quantitative easing programs raise questions about the effectiveness of central banking policy and their impact on the banking sector. I find that the zero lower bound reduces liquidity reserves of banks and thus creates less credit supply. The T-LTRO program, developed by the European Central Bank, has helped to tackle this problem. However, the recently expanded asset purchase program reveals the opposite effect. Hence, the recent liquidity provisions by central banks have put incentives rather on de-leveraging than bank lending.
The use of digital, IT-based components in physical products is becoming increasingly relevant in practice. Surprisingly, the strategic impact of these "digitized products" has not received a lot of attention in IS research so far. Extant papers on the topic rely on ambiguous terminology (e.g., "smart products", "cyber-physical systems", "digital product-service systems") and underlying concepts differ widely. Based on an extensive literature review, this article provides an overview of the different terms and identifies five conceptual elements that form the building blocks of digitized products in research: "hybridity" (i.e., the combination of digital and physical components), connectivity, smartness, digitized product-service bundles (servitization of digitized products), and digitized product ecosystems. The implication for practitioners is that each element comes with different managerial challenges that companies need to address when incorporating the respective element in their products. The research implication is that each conceptual element is supported by different theoretical streams.
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss the applicability of current benchmarking proposals for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and to suggest a condensed process for logistics benchmarking in SMEs.
Design/methodology/approach – The paper starts by outlining why the logistics function is of increasing importance for SMEs. It discusses the benefit of logistics benchmarking and typical SME restrictions in benchmarking. Available approaches to benchmarking are discussed and their weaknesses when applied to SME logistics benchmarking are analyzed. The paper develops a new benchmarking process framework for SME logistics benchmarking and reports findings of a case application in three German SMEs.
Increasingly volatile market conditions and manufacturing environments combined with a rising demand for highly personalized products, the emergence of new technologies like cyber-physical systems and additive manufacturing as well as an increasing cross-linking of different entities (Industrie 4.0) will result in fundamental changes of future work and logistics systems. The place of production, the logistical network and the respective production system will underlie the requirements of constant changes and therefore sources and sinks of logistical networks have to obey the versatility of (cyber-physical) production systems. To cope with the arising complexity to control and monitor changeable production and logistics systems, decentralized control systems are the mean of choice since centralized systems are pushed to their limits in this regard. This paradigm shift will affect the overall concept under which production and logistics is planned, managed and controlled and how companies interact and collaborate within the emerging value chains by using dynamic methods to generate and execute the created network and to allocate available resources to fulfill the demand for customized products. In this field of research learning factories, like the ESB Logistics Learning Factory at ESB Business School (Reutlingen University), provide a great potential as a risk free test bed to develop new methods and technical solutions, to investigate new technologies regarding their practical use and to transfer the latest state of knowledge and specific competences into the training of students and professionals. Keeping with these guiding principles ESB Business School is transferring its existing production system into a cyber-physical production system to investigate innovative solutions for the design of human-machine collaboration and technical assistance systems as wells as to develop decentralized control methods for intralogistics systems following the requirements of changeable work systems including the respective design of dynamic inbound and outbound logistic networks.
Recent MIT CISR research found that an obsessive focus on innovation is a characteristic of CIOs of top-performing firms. There are now more ways than ever that a firm can be disrupted by and disruptive with digital innovations. Indeed, a growing number of firms and individuals are using increasingly powerful digital technologies and figuring out ways to develop better products and services, better customer and employee experiences, and new business models. The new digital imperative is to compete with more types of digital innovations - and IT units must refine approaches to producing them. Based on an in-depth caste study, this briefing takes a look at how German car manufacturer AUDI AG has expanded its portfolio of digital innovations.
This article highlights three major outcomes from global employability surveys about the topic of gender diversity. Students and graduates of two master programs at ESB Business School of Reutlingen University in Germany were asked about their study programs, their expected and their realized career paths, and their individual well-being. This article highlights selected gender differences that were discovered in the analysis and underlines results on specific gender issues. The three major outcomes are: firstly, men and women work in different industries, functions, and leadership positions; secondly, there is a potential for unfulfilled expectations of young managers regarding their achievement of certain positions and the realization of their private goals; thirdly, by looking at the graduates’ career paths in combination with their well-being, a low level of satisfaction with work-life balance and high levels of stress could be identified. The results give valuable insights into the conceptual world of students at the beginning of their career and as future managers. Looking at gender differences and gender issues leads to interesting findings which can be used for further research and discussions at ESB Business School. By contrasting the outcomes of the alumni survey with outcomes of the student survey, significant differences between the awareness of students and the reality of the graduates concerning gender diversity issues were discovered. The disclosed gap between students’ expectations and the real-life situations of the alumni indicates further areas for discussion. One major question is how students can cope with these challenges and issues of gender diversity management in future management positions as (female) managers while taking corporate social responsibility into consideration.
Gamification, the use of game elements for non-gaming purposes, may just make a huge impact on education, a contribution the world in general and South Africa in particular, desperately needs. In today’s fast-paced work environment, there is not only a severe skills shortage, but also a great need for graduates with practical knowledge - students that are not purely “book smart”. Didactic teaching habits have created an education realm in which reciting facts is more often than not what gets students to pass. Learning factories are physical, operational factories that serve as exemplary and realistic hands-on learning environments and provide an important step towards more industry-prepared graduates. Top universities around the world are establishing such environments and are showing superb results. This paper explores the potential benefit of applying gamification in such a setting to enhance the learning environment even further, and provide opportunities for training otherwise difficult to teach topics, such as shop floor management.
The paper focuses on a recently introduced paradigm for the logistic process of picking, with respect to the man-to-goods and goods-to-man concept: the robot to-goods. First the task and system architecture of the fast deployable autonomous commissioning system are described, then the economic efficiency of the system is analysed in a real business case scenario using a simplified method, which is explained and discussed. The clearly positive net present value of the investment and the short payback period obtained in the business case prove how the robot-to-goods paradigm for the commissioning process, implemented through the automation of the forklift platform, is economically attractive for small and medium size enterprises.
In 2016, German car manufacturer the Audi Group (AUDI AG) was working on an expanding array of digital innovations. The goals of these innovations varied, and included strengthening customer- and employee-facing processes, digitally enhancing existing products, and developing new, potentially disruptive business models. Audi's IT unit was critical to each of these efforts. This case examines the different ways in which digitization can help to enhance and transform an organization's processes, products, and business models. The case also highlights the challenges that may arise as organizations attempt to expand and diversify their portfolio of digital innovations.
The most important objective of event marketing is to improve the image of a brand or a company. The paper presents an image transfer model for event marketing. Based on current research, an image transfer model for event marketing is developed and the conditions required for an image transfer to take place from an event to a brand or a company are explained. Depending on which conditions are met, there are different consequences with regard to the image transfer from the event to the brand or company that are structured and characterized in detail. The image transfer model is developed against the backdrop of selected event types often used in actual practice. The focus of its application lies mainly in brand-oriented leisure and infotainment events directed towards external target groups. The model provides a discussion and analysis of the impact category of the image transfer in event marketing. The paper explains that the possibility of an attitude change is given within the context of event marketing. The presented model serves to structure the image transfer in event marketing. It is intended to illustrate the steps that are involved in the emergence of an image transfer as well as the resulting alternative consequences.
Assuming that employment prospects in the country of education represent a pull factor for international students to enroll in higher education programs abroad and a selling proposition for higher education institutions campaigning for international students, this study aims at investigating the validity of these prospects. Using a qualitative research approach, in-depth interviews were conducted with recruiters of 12 companies in Germany and Russia. A content analysis was applied to identify and compare employment opportunities and barriers for international graduates with domestic degrees at individual, organizational, and institutional levels. Findings include that country-specific human capital components are highly valued by employers, that the organization’s stage of internationalization determines the valuation of human capital components as well as the availability of customized recruiting practices, and that the institutional framewor —particularly the law on labor migration—influences employers’ receptivity for international graduates as well as their international staffing strategies in general. Findings are interpreted on the background of pertinent theoretical perspectives. Conclusions are drawn and recommendations given for international students, higher education institutions, employers, and policy-makers.
This article studies the development of e-governance over time and across countries. We use a large data sample consisting of 99 developing and 34 OECD countries to study this notion. Firstly, we study the development of e-governance. Secondly, we estimate models to check the determining factors of e-governance over time and across countries. The study reveals that the level of e-governance is determined by the degree of e-participation, online access as well as GDP per capita.
Efficiency in supply chain risk management (SCRM) is a major topic in industries with serial production and a complex supply chain due to limited management and financial resources. A high number of possible risk situations and intertwined processes create a more challenging environment for resource allocation. Managers cannot perform SCRM in all possible supply chain areas and hence have to decide where available resources should be utilised for highest possible risk reduction. This makes it important to quickly and systematically evaluate input and output relationships among risk mitigation actions to determine which actions are deployed first for efficient risk level reduction. This paper introduces a new SCRM method based on the failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA) in order to perform an efficiency-oriented risk action prioritisation. By considering the cost-benefit evaluation of identified risk mitigation actions for each assessed risk and by determining the implementation effort for risk mitigation actions, also considered as the cost for realising a specific risk action the method allows finding those risk and risk mitigation actions, which are most efficient for risk reduction and should be implemented first in the process of risk steering.
In its 100+ years of company history, IBM reinvented itself multiple times. In the last 20 years, IBM had shifted from individual products to integrated solutions and moved to become a globally integrated enterprise with standardized processes. In 2014, the expanding adoption of social, mobile, analytics, and cloud (SMAC) technologies generated excitement in the industry. IBM believed these technologies presented a huge growth opportunity. Simultaneously, management viewed SMAC technologies as disruptive forces demanding transformative changes to how IBM worked. And introducing new ways of working to 400,000 employees in 175 countries was a daunting task.
Based on personal interviews with 17 IBM business and IT executives, the case illustrates organizational challenges of introducing current technologies that even providers of these technologies face – in other words, when they “eat their own cooking.” It demonstrates the difficulties large companies face when implementing technologies that students use daily and take for granted.
The proliferation of convergence of digital technologies SMACIT (social, mobile, analytics, cloud, and Internet of Things) has created significant threats and opportunities to established companies. Business leaders must rethink their business strategies and develop what we refer to as a digital strategy. Our research shows four keys to successfully defining and executing a digital strategy:
1. zeroing in on a customer engagement or digitized solutions strategy to guide the transformation, 2. building operational excellence, 3. creating a powerful digital services backbone to facilitate rapid innovation and responsiveness, and 4. ensuring ongoing organizational redesign. A list of publications from the research is provided at the end of this document.
The digital economy poses existential threats to — and game-changing opportunities for — companies that were successful in the pre-digital economy. What will distinguish those companies that successfully transform from those that become historical footnotes? This is the question a group of six researchers and consultants from Boston Consulting Group set out to examine. The team conducted in-depth interviews with senior executives at twenty-seven companies in different industries to explore the strategies and organizational initiatives they relied on to seize the opportunities associated with new, readily accessible digital technologies. This paper summarizes findings from this research and offers recommendations to business leaders responsible for digital business success.
The increasing emergence of cyber-physical systems (CPS) and a global crosslinking of these CPS to cyber-physical production systems (CPPS) are leading to fundamental changes of future work and logistic systems requiring innovative methods to plan, control and monitor changeable production systems and new forms of human-machine-collaboration. Particularly logistic systems have to obey the versatility of CPPS and will be transferred to so-called cyber physical logistic systems, since the logistical networks will underlie the requirements of constant changes initiated by changeable production systems. This development is driven and enhanced by increasingly volatile and globalized market and manufacturing environments combined with a high demand for individualized products and services. Also nowadays mainly used centralized control systems are pushed to their limits regarding their abilities to deal with the arising complexity to plan, control and monitor changeable work and logistic systems. Decentralized control systems bear the potential to cope with these challenges by distributing the required operations on various nodes of the resulting decentralized control system.
Learning factories, like the ESB Logistics Learning Factory at ESB Business School (Reutlingen University), provide a wide range of possibilities to develop new methods and innovative technical solutions in a risk-free and close-to-reality factory environment and to transfer knowledge as well as specific competences into the training of students and professionals. To intensify the research and training activities in the field of future work and logistics systems, ESB Business School is transferring its existing production system into a CPPS involving decentralized planning, control and monitoring methods and systems, human-machine-collaboration as well as technical assistance systems for changeable work and logistics systems.
Contemporary theory and practice of organizations. - Part 2: Leading and changing the organization
(2016)
Organizations are the business world´s central actors, employing multiple people who pursue collective goals while linked to an external environment. The text is filled with contributions by alumni of the ESB Business School at Reutlingen University. Part II provides a detailed overview of key themes in modern leadership and coaching, as well as organizational intervention.
Organizations are the business world´s central actors, employing multiple people who pursue collective goals while linked to an external environment. This volume is the first of two books dedicated to defining current theories of organizations and their practices. The text is filled with contributions by alumni of the ESB Business School at Reutlingen University. Part I discusses contemporary organizational forms and properties, including team aspects.
This article reviews the literature on Christmas economics. First, we present an overall picture of the debate on the potential welfare loss of gift-giving and we show strategies that reduce the potential welfare loss and might increase the number of presents received. Second, we discuss the effect of Christmas on prices and the business cycle. We provide evidence that at Christmas stock prices and airfares increase, while food prices decrease.
Branding in sports
(2016)
Brands are ubiquitous in the sports business. The significance of the brand is fuelled not only by the various functions that a brand performs for providers and consumers in sports, but by the monetary value that brands have come to represent for sporting organizations. As part of the commercialization and professionalization of sports, a uniform brand presence is becoming increasingly important for sporting organizations. The implication is the need for systematic and integral brand management. This chapter initially examines the key features of sports from the marketing perspective and the most important fundamentals of sport marketing. Based on this, we will demonstrate specifically how brands in sports are established and cultivated.
It is assumed that more education leads to better understanding of complex systems. Some researchers claim, however, find indications that simple mechanisms like stocks and flows are not well understood even by people who have passed higher education. In this paper, we test people’s understanding of complex systems with the widely studied stock-and-flow (SF) tasks (Booth Sweeney and Sterman 2000). SF tasks assess people’s understanding of the interplay between stocks and flows. We investigate SF failure of domain experts and novices in different knowledge domains. In particular, we compare performance on the original study’s Bathtub task with the square wave pattern (Booth Sweeney and Sterman 2000) with two alternative cover stories from the engineering and business domains on different groups of business and engineering students from different semesters. Further, we show that, while engineering students perform better than business students, with progressing in higher education, students seem to lose the capability of dealing with simple SF tasks from domains other than their field. We thus find hints on déformation professionelle in higher education.
Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to comprehensively characterise the interdisciplinary phenomenon of ambush marketing in sports, structure its manifestations, illustrate the consequences associated with ambush marketing and provide a critical evaluation from an objective perspective.
Design/methodology/approach: Various approaches to the definition of ambush marketing are presented and the objectives pursued with ambush marketing are identified. In this paper a new approach has been developed to structure the strategies and manifestations of ambush marketing.
Findings: It is a fine line between creative marketing and infringing on sponsorship rights. So the interdisciplinary phenomenon ambush marketing is discussed controversially. Ambush marketing is situated at the intersection of two opposing spheres of interest conducting a battle for shares of the marketing potential of a sports event. On one side there is the disparaging view of ambush marketing founded on legal and/or ethical considerations. On the other, the author has the respectful assessment of ambushers characterised by their innovative, creative marketing.
Practical implications: The analysis conducted in this paper leads to the conclusion that a general evaluation or condemnation of ambush marketing is not feasible. A four-field matrix emerges from the combination of a legal statutory consideration on one hand and an ethical-moral assessment on the other.
Originality/value: The paper describes and structures ambush marketing in a novel form and discusses illustrating examples from major sporting events. Ambush marketing is evaluated from a neutral perspective by summarising the opportunities and threats of ambush marketing which leads to a nuanced contemplation of ambush marketing.
For many companies, it is major international sporting events (in particular the Football World Cup or the Olympic Games) that constitute the ideal platform for the integration of their target group-specific marketing communication into an attractive sports environment. Sports event organizers sell exclusive marketing rights for their events to official sponsors, who, in return, acquire exclusive options to utilize the event for their own advertising purposes. Ambush marketing is the method used by companies that do not hold marketin rights to an event, but still use their marketing activities in diverse ways to establish a connection to it. There is still whidespread debate and confusion about the topic. Ambush marketing is often defined in different ways, by different people, according to their position as either supporters of opponents of the practice.
A seamless convergence of the digital and physical factory aiming in personalized Product Emergence Process (PPEP) for smart products within ESB Logistics Learning Factory at Reutlingen University.
A completely new business model with reference to Industrie4.0 and facilitated by 3D experience software in today's networked society in which customers expect immediate responses, delightful experience and simple solutions is one of the mission scenarios in the ESB Logistics Learning Factory at ESB Business School (Reutlingen University).
The business experience platform provides software solutions for every organization in the company respectively in the factory. An interface with dashboards, project management apps, 3D - design and construction apps with high end visualization, manufacturing and simulation apps as well as intelligence and social network apps in a collaborative interactive environment help the user to learn the creation of a value end to end process for a personalized virtual and later real produced product.
Instead of traditional ways of working and a conventional operating factory real workers and robots work semi-intuitive together. Centerpiece in the self-planned interim factory is the smart personalized product, uniquely identifiable and locatable at all times during the production process – a scooter with an individual colored mobile phone – holder for any smart phone produced with a 3D printer in lot size one. Smart products have in the future solutions incorporated internet based services – designed and manufactured - at the costs of mass products. Additionally the scooter is equipped with a retrievable declarative product memory. Monitoring and control is handled by sensor tags and a raspberry positioned on the product. The engineering design and implementation of a changeable production system is guided by a self-execution system that independently find amongst others esplanade workplaces.
The imparted competences to students and professionals are project management method SCRUM, customization of workflows by Industrie4.0 principles, the enhancements of products with new personalized intelligent parts, electrical and electronic selfprogrammed components and the control of access of the product memory information, to plan in a digital engineering environment and set up of the physical factory to produce customer orders. The gained action-orientated experience refers to the chances and requirements for holistic digital and physical systems.
This paper is a commentary on the book ‘Probability and stochastic processes’ from Ionut Florescu. The book is an excellent introduction to both probability theory and stochastic processes. It provides a comprehensive discussion of the main statistical concepts including the theorems and proofs. The introduction to probability theory is easy accessible and a perfect starting point for undergraduate students even with majors in other subjects than science, such as business or engineering. The book is also up-to-date because it includes programming code for simulations. However, the book has some weaknesses. It is less convincing in more advanced topics of stochastic theory and it does not include solutions to excises and recent research trends.
This article is a review of the book "Brain computation as hierarchical abstraction" by Dana H. Ballard published by MIT press in 2015. The book series computational neuroscience familiarizes the reader with the computational aspects of brain functions based on neuroscientific evidence. It provides an excellent introduction of the functioning, i.e. the structure, the network and the routines of the brain in our daily life. The final chapters even discuss behavioral elements such as decision-making, emotions and consciousness. These topics are of high relevance in other sciences such as economics and philosophy. Overall, Ballard’s book stimulates a scientifically well-founded debate and, more importantly, reveals the need of an interdisciplinary dialogue towards social sciences.
The financial crisis of 2007-2010 was probably one of the greatest, most lustrous black-swan events that people of our generation(s) will experience – and at its heart, it was a dynamic phenomenon. It is stated in the vision of the System Dynamics Society that we aspire to transform society by influencing decision-making. Yet, it seems as if system dynamics did not play any significant role in this crisis: we did not examine the markets, we did not provide insights to banks, and we did not warn governments or the people. In our presentation we describe the dynamics involved in a housing bubble, and describe what made the last one different. With the insights gained from this exercise we conclude that, from a system dynamics perspective, the dimension of the financial crisis of 2007-2009 was eminently foreseeable, which will lead us to pose the following question: where were we as a field while this crisis was unfolding, why were we not active players? We present a range of potential answers to this question, hoping to provoke some reflection… and maybe some (re)action.
This article analyses and compares the performance of regulators in the fields of finance and sport, especially cycling. I hypothesize that the courses of crises or scandals is the best time to study the lessons of regulatory response. First, I take into account the differences in both finance and cycling by looking at the nature of the rules and institutions governing the field. Second, I estimate the attention effect on new regulation in response to crises or scandals. The interest of the paper is in the alignment of incentives to prevent regulatory capture and to ensure accountability and enforceability. The paper concludes that the differences hold important lessons that call for the reform of rules and institutions governing finance and cycling alike.