Search results for: market positioning

Authors: Bouwer Kleynhans

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The built environment is responsible for about 40% of the world’s energy consumption and generates one third of global carbon dioxide emissions. The Green Building Council of South Africa’s (GBCSA) current rating tools are all for new buildings. By far the largest portion of buildings exist stock and therefore the need to develop a certification tool for existing buildings. Direct energy measurement comprises 27% of the total available points in this tool. The aim of this paper is to describe the development process of a green star certification tool for existing buildings in South Africa with specific emphasis on the energy measurement criteria. Successful implementation of this tool within the property market will ensure a reduced carbon footprint of buildings.

Keywords: certification tool, development process, energy consumption, green buildings

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Authors: Imran Ali

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General chemotherapy for cancer treatment has many side and toxic effects. A new approach of targeting nano anti-cancer drug is under development stage and only few drugs are available in the market today. The unique features of these drugs are targeted action on cancer cells only without any side effect. Sometimes, these are called magic drugs. The important molecules used for nano anti-cancer drugs are cisplatin, carboplatin, bleomycin, 5-fluorouracil, doxorubicin, dactinomycin, 6-mercaptopurine, paclitaxel, topotecan, vinblastin and etoposide etc. The most commonly used materials for preparing nano particles carriers are dendrimers, polymeric, liposomal, micelles inorganic, organic etc. The proposed lecture will comprise the-of-art of nano drugs in cancer chemo-therapy including preparation, types of drugs, mechanism, future perspectives etc.

Keywords: cancer, nano-anti-cancer drugs, chemo-therapy, mechanism of action, future perspectives

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Authors: Nadine Sangster, Akil James, Rondell Duke, Aaron Ameerali, Terrence Lalla

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The market place of the 21st century is evolving into one of merging national markets, fragmented consumer markets, and rapidly changing product technologies. The use of new technologies has become vital to the manufacturing industry for their survival and sustainability. This work focused on the assembly type industry in a small developing country and aimed at identifying the use of advanced manufacturing technologies and their impact on this sector of the manufacturing industry. It was found that some technologies were being used and that they had improved the effectiveness of those companies but there was still quite a bit of room for improvements. Some of the recommendations included benchmarking against international standards, the adoption of a “made in TT” campaign and the effective utilisation of the technologies to improve manufacturing effectiveness and thus improve competitive advantages and strategies.

Keywords: advanced manufacturing technology, Trinidad and Tobago, manufacturing, industrial engineering

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Authors: Olga Gomez De Miranda, Jose R. Ochoa-Gomez, Stefaan De Wildeman, Luciano Monsegue, Soraya Prieto, Leire Lorenzo, Cristina Dineiro

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The chemical industry is facing a new revolution. As long as processes based on the exploitation of fossil resources emerged with force in the XIX century, Society currently demands a new radical change that will lead to the complete and irreversible implementation of a circular sustainable economic model. The implementation of biorefineries will be essential for this. There, renewable raw materials as sugars and other biomass resources are exploited for the development of new materials that will partially replace their petroleum-derived homologs in a safer, and environmentally more benign approach. Isosorbide, (1,4:3,6-dianhydro-d-glucidol) is a primary bio-based derivative obtained from the plant (poly) saccharides and a very interesting example of a useful chemical produced in biorefineries. It can, in turn, be converted to other secondary monomers as isosorbide bis-methyl carbonate (IBMC), whose main field of application can be as a key biodegradable intermediary substitute of bisphenol-A in the manufacture of polycarbonates, or as an alternative to the toxic isocyanates in the synthesis of new polyurethanes (non-isocyanate polyurethanes) both with a huge application market. New products will present advantageous mechanical or optical properties, as well as improved behavior in non-toxicity and biodegradability aspects in comparison to their petro-derived alternatives. A robust production process of IBMC, a biomass-derived chemical, is here presented. It can be used with different raw material qualities using dimethyl carbonate (DMC) as both co-reactant and solvent. It consists of the transesterification of isosorbide with DMC under soft operational conditions, using different basic catalysts, always active with the isosorbide characteristics and purity. Appropriate isolation processes have been also developed to obtain crude IBMC yields higher than 90%, with oligomers production lower than 10%, independently of the quality of the isosorbide considered. All of them are suitable to be used in polycondensation reactions for polymers obtaining. If higher qualities of IBMC are needed, a purification treatment based on nanofiltration membranes has been also developed. The IBMC reaction-isolation conditions established in the laboratory have been successfully modeled using appropriate software programs and moved to a pilot-scale (production of 100 kg of IBMC). It has been demonstrated that a highly efficient IBMC production process able to be up-scaled under suitable market conditions has been obtained. Operational conditions involved the production of IBMC involve soft temperature and energy needs, no additional solvents, and high operational efficiency. All of them are according to green manufacturing rules.

Keywords: biomass, catalyst, isosorbide bis-methyl carbonate, polycarbonate, polyurethane, transesterification

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Authors: Revaz Gvelesiani

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The problem of compliance between the state economic policy and entrepreneurial policy of businesses is primarily manifested in the contradictions related to the congruence between entrepreneurship development and self-development strategies. Among various types (financial, monetary, social, etc.) of the state economic policy aiming at the development of entrepreneurship, economic order policy is of special importance. Its goal is to set the framework for both public and private economic activities and achieve coherence between the societal value system and the formation of the economic order framework. Economic order policy, in its turn, involves intrinsic contradiction between the social and the competitive order. Competitive order is oriented on the principle of success, while social order _ on the criteria of need satisfaction, which contradicts, at least partly, to the principles of success. Thus within the economic order policy, on the one hand, the state makes efforts to form social order and expand its frontiers, while, on the other hand, market is determined to establish functioning competitive order and ensure its realization. Locating the adequate spaces for and setting the rational border between the state (social order) and the private (competitive order) activities, represents the phenomenon of the decisive importance from the entrepreneurship development strategy standpoint. In the countries where the above mentioned spaces and borders are “set” correctly, entrepreneurship agents (small, medium-sized and large businesses) achieve great success by means of seizing the respective segments and maintaining the leading positions in the internal, the European and the world markets for a long time. As for the entrepreneurship self-development strategy, above all, it involves: •market identification; •interactions with consumers; •continuous innovations; •competition strategy; •relationships with partners; •new management philosophy, etc. The analysis of compliance between the entrepreneurship strategy and entrepreneurship culture should be the reference point for any kind of internationalization in order to avoid shocks of cultural nature and the economic backwardness. Stabilization can be achieved only when the employee actions reflect the existing culture and the new contents of culture (targeted culture) is turned into the implicit consciousness of the personnel. The future leaders should learn how to manage different cultures. Entrepreneurship can be managed successfully if its strategy and culture are coherent. However, not rarely enterprises (organizations) show various forms of violation of both personal and team actions. If personal and team non-observances appear as the form of influence upon the culture, it will lead to global destruction of the system and structure. This is the entrepreneurship culture pathology that complicates to achieve compliance between the entrepreneurship strategy and entrepreneurship culture. Thus, the intrinsic contradictions of entrepreneurship development and self-development strategies complicate the task of reaching compliance between the state economic policy and the company entrepreneurship policy: on the one hand, there is a contradiction between the social and the competitive order within economic order policy and on the other hand, the contradiction exists between entrepreneurship strategy and entrepreneurship culture within entrepreneurship policy.

Keywords: economic order policy, entrepreneurship, development contradictions, self-development contradictions

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Authors: Madiha Qureshi

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The study was designed to explore the morphological variation of Aseel chicken varieties in district Hyderabad. A survey was conducted during 5th April 2017 to 23rd August 2017 in four localities of district Hyderabad including Tandojam, Goth karan khan shoro, tower market and railway line colony. A total number of 54 samples (20 males and 34 females) of six varieties of Aseel chicken breed (Sindhi, Mottled, Black, Lakha, Jawa, Kulang) were studied and identify with different morphological characters such as comb type, size of wattles and earlobes, plumage color, shank color, beak color and eye color. Great morphological diversity was observed among these varieties, and this study provides baseline information for future research in the area.

Keywords: Aseel, Hyderabad, wattle, earlobe, comb

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Authors: Aliyu J. Abubakar, Mazlan Hashim, Amin B. Pour

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Exploiting geothermal resources for either power, home heating, Spa, greenhouses, industrial or tourism requires an initial identification of suitable areas. This can be done cost-effectively using remote sensing satellite imagery which has synoptic capabilities of covering large areas in real time and by identifying possible areas of hydrothermal alteration and minerals related to Geothermal systems. Earth features and minerals are known to have unique diagnostic spectral reflectance characteristics that can be used to discriminate them. The focus of this paper is to investigate the applicability of mapping hydrothermal alteration in relation to geothermal systems (thermal springs) at Yankari Park Northeastern Nigeria, using Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) satellite data for resource exploration. The ASTER Short Wave Infrared (SWIR) bands are used to highlight and discriminate alteration areas by employing sophisticated digital image processing techniques including image transformations and spectral mapping methods. Field verifications are conducted at the Yankari Park using hand held Global Positioning System (GPS) monterra to identify locations of hydrothermal alteration and rock samples obtained at the vicinity and surrounding areas of the ‘Mawulgo’ and ‘Wikki’ thermal springs. X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) results of rock samples obtained from the field validated hydrothermal alteration by the presence of indicator minerals including; Dickite, Kaolinite, Hematite and Quart. The study indicated the applicability of mapping geothermal anomalies for resource exploration in unmapped sparsely vegetated savanna environment characterized by subtle surface manifestations such as thermal springs. The results could have implication for geothermal resource exploration especially at the prefeasibility stages by narrowing targets for comprehensive surveys and in unexplored savanna regions where expensive airborne surveys are unaffordable.

Keywords: geothermal exploration, image enhancement, minerals, spectral mapping

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Authors: Maria Amaia Iza Padilla, Ibai Ostolozaga

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The objective of this paper is to analyze how transportation costs between regions within a country can affect not only domestic trade but also the allocation of resources in a given region, aggregate productivity, and relative domestic prices (tradable versus non-tradable). On the one hand, there is a vast literature that analyzes the transportation costs faced by countries when trading with the rest of the world. However, this paper focuses on the effect of transportation costs on domestic trade. Countries differ in their domestic road infrastructure and transport quality. There is also some literature that focuses on the effect of road infrastructure on the price difference between regions but not on relative prices at the aggregate level. On the other hand, this work is also related to the literature on resource misallocation. Finally, the paper is also related to the literature analyzing the effect of trade on the development of the manufacturing sector. Using the World Bank Enterprise Survey database, it is observed cross-country differences in the proportion of firms that consider transportation as an obstacle. From the International Comparison Program, we obtain a significant negative correlation between GDP per worker and relative prices (manufacturing sector prices relative to the service sector). Furthermore, there is a significant negative correlation between a country’s transportation quality and the relative price of manufactured goods with respect to the price of services in that country. This is consistent with the empirical evidence of a negative correlation between transportation quality and GDP per worker, on the one hand, and the negative correlation between GDP per worker and domestic relative prices, on the other. It is also shown that in a country, the share of manufacturing firms whose main market is at the local (regional) level is negatively related to the quality of the transportation infrastructure within the country. Similarly, this index is positively related to the share of manufacturing firms whose main market is national or international. The data also shows that those countries with a higher proportion of manufacturing firms operating locally have higher relative prices. With this information in hand, the paper attempts to quantify the effects of the allocation of resources between and within sectors. The higher the trade barriers caused by transportation costs, the less efficient allocation, which causes lower aggregate productivity. Second, it is built a two-sector model where regions within a country trade with each other. On the one hand, it is found that with respect to the manufacturing sector, those countries with less trade between their regions will be characterized by a smaller variety of goods, less productive manufacturing firms on average, and higher relative prices for manufactured goods relative to service sector prices. Thus, the decline in the relative price of manufactured goods in more advanced countries could also be explained by the degree of trade between regions. This trade allows for efficient intra-industry allocation (traders are more productive, and resources are allocated more efficiently)).

Keywords: misallocation, relative prices, TFP, transportation cost

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Authors: Jaehong Kim, Sunhee Park, HongSeop Shin, Kyongho Lim, Suhyun Kwon, Don-Gyou Lee, Pureum Kim, Moojong Lim, JongSang Baek

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Transparent displays with OLEDs are the most commonly produced forms of see-through displays on the market or in development. In order to block the visual interruption caused by the light coming from the background, the special panel is combined with transparent displays with OLEDs. There is, however, few studies optical performance of operational shutter panel for transparent displays until now. This paper, therefore, describes the optical performance of operational shutter panels. The novel evaluation method was developed by measuring the amount of light which can form a transmitted background image. The new proposed method could tell how recognize transmitted background images cannot be seen, and is consistent with viewer’s perception.

Keywords: transparent display, operational shutter panel, optical performance, OLEDs

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Authors: Ssu-Han Chen, Der-Baau Perng

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Molding process in IC manufacturing secures chips against the harms done by hot, moisture or other external forces. While a chip was being molded, defects like cracks, dilapidation, or voids may be embedding on the molding surface. The molding surfaces the study poises to treat and the ones on the market, though, differ in the surface where texture similar to defects is everywhere. Manual inspection usually passes over low-contrast cracks or voids; hence an automatic optical inspection system for molding surface is necessary. The proposed system is consisted of a CCD, a coaxial light, a back light as well as a motion control unit. Based on the property of statistical textures of the molding surface, a series of digital image processing and classification procedure is carried out. After training of the parameter associated with above algorithm, result of the experiment suggests that the accuracy rate is up to 93.75%, contributing to the inspection quality of IC molding surface.

Keywords: molding surface, machine vision, statistical texture, discrete Fourier transformation

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Authors: Medani Prasad Rijal

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The study outlines the impacts of decentralized forest policy on natural Sal (shorea robusta) forests in the Terai region of Nepal. The government has implemented community forestry program to manage the forest resources and improve the livelihood of local people collectively. The forest management authorities such as conserve, manage, develop and use of forest resources were shifted to the local communities, however, the ownership right of the forestland retained by the government. Local communities took the decision on harvesting, distribution, and sell of forest products by fixing the prices independently. The local communities were putting the low value of forest products and distributed among the user households on the name of collective decision. The decision of low valuation is devaluating the worth of forest products. Therefore, the study hypothesized that decision-making capacities are equally prominent next to the decentralized policy and program formulation. To accomplish the study, individual to group level discussions and questionnaire survey methods were applied with executive committee members and user households. The study revealed that the local intuition called Community Forest User Group (CFUG) committee normally took the decisions on consensus basis. Considering to the access and affording capacity of user households having poor economic backgrounds, low pricing mechanism of forest products has been practiced, even though the Sal timber is far expensive in the local market. The local communities thought that low pricing mechanism is accessible to all user households from poor to better off households. However, the analysis of forest products distribution opposed the assumption as most of the Sal timber, which is the most valuable forest product of community forest only purchased by the limited households of better economic conditions. Since the Terai region is heterogeneous by socio-economic conditions, better off households always have higher affording capacity and possibility of taking higher timber benefits because of low price mechanism. On the other hand, the minimum price rate of forest products has poor contribution in community fund collection. Consequently, it has poor support to carry out poverty alleviation activities to poor people. The local communities have been fixed Sal timber price rate around three times cheaper than normal market price, which is a strong evidence of forest product devaluation itself. Finally, the study concluded that the capacity building of local executives as the decision-makers of natural Sal forests is equally indispensable next to the policy and program formulation for effective decentralized forest management. Unilateral decentralized forest policy may devaluate the forest products rather than devolve of power to the local communities and empower to them.

Keywords: community forestry program, decentralized forest policy, Nepal, Sal forests, Terai

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Authors: Lucia Pappalardo, Sara Abdul Majid Azzam

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Camel milk is widely consumed by people living in arid areas of the world, where it is also known for its potential therapeutic and medical properties. Indeed it has been used as a treatment for several diseases such as tuberculosis, dropsy, asthma, jaundice and leishmaniasis in India, Sudan and some parts of Russia. A wealth of references is available in literature for the composition of milk from different diary animals such as cows, goats and sheep. Camel milk instead has not been extensively studied, despite its nutritional value. In this study commercial cow and camel milk samples, bought from the local market, were analyzed by 1D 1H-NMR and multivariate statistics in order to identify the different composition of the low-molecular-weight compounds in the milk mixtures. The samples were analyzed in their native conditions without any pre-treatment. Our preliminary study shows that the two different types of milk samples differ in the content of metabolites such as orotate, fats and more.

Keywords: camel, cow, milk, Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR)

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Authors: Brennan Lodge

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Amidst a complex regulatory landscape, Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) emerges as a transformative tool for Governance Risk and Compliance (GRC) officers. This paper details the application of RAG in synthesizing Large Language Models (LLMs) with external knowledge bases, offering GRC professionals an advanced means to adapt to rapid changes in compliance requirements. While the development for standalone LLM’s (Large Language Models) is exciting, such models do have their downsides. LLM’s cannot easily expand or revise their memory, and they can’t straightforwardly provide insight into their predictions, and may produce “hallucinations.” Leveraging a pre-trained seq2seq transformer and a dense vector index of domain-specific data, this approach integrates real-time data retrieval into the generative process, enabling gap analysis and the dynamic generation of compliance and risk management content. We delve into the mechanics of RAG, focusing on its dual structure that pairs parametric knowledge contained within the transformer model with non-parametric data extracted from an updatable corpus. This hybrid model enhances decision-making through context-rich insights, drawing from the most current and relevant information, thereby enabling GRC officers to maintain a proactive compliance stance. Our methodology aligns with the latest advances in neural network fine-tuning, providing a granular, token-level application of retrieved information to inform and generate compliance narratives. By employing RAG, we exhibit a scalable solution that can adapt to novel regulatory challenges and cybersecurity threats, offering GRC officers a robust, predictive tool that augments their expertise. The granular application of RAG’s dual structure not only improves compliance and risk management protocols but also informs the development of compliance narratives with pinpoint accuracy. It underscores AI’s emerging role in strategic risk mitigation and proactive policy formation, positioning GRC officers to anticipate and navigate the complexities of regulatory evolution confidently.

Keywords: cybersecurity, gen AI, retrieval augmented generation, cybersecurity defense strategies

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Authors: Bita Mashayekhi, Zeynab Lotfi Aghel

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The determinants of Earnings Response Coefficient (ERC), including firm size, earnings growth, and earnings persistence are studied in this research. These determinants are supposed to be moderator variables that affect ERC and Return Response Coefficient. The research sample contains 82 Iranian listed companies in Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE) from 2001 to 2012. Gathered data have been processed by EVIEWS Software. Results show a significant positive relation between firm size and ERC, and also between earnings growth and ERC; however, there is no significant relation between earnings persistence and ERC. Also, the results show that ERC will be increased by firm size and earnings growth, but there is no relation between earnings persistence and ERC.

Keywords: earnings response coefficient (ERC), return response coefficient (RRC), firm size, earnings growth, earnings persistence

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Authors: Michael Gidey Gebru

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Most DEA models operate in a static environment with input and output parameters that are chosen by deterministic data. However, due to ambiguity brought on shifting market conditions, input and output data are not always precisely gathered in real-world scenarios. Fuzzy numbers can be used to address this kind of ambiguity in input and output data. Therefore, this work aims to expand crisp DEA into DEA with fuzzy environment. In this study, the input and output data are regarded as fuzzy triangular numbers. Then, the DEA model with fuzzy environment is solved using a multi-objective method to gauge the Decision Making Units’ efficiency. Finally, the developed DEA model is illustrated with an application on real data 50 educational institutions.

Keywords: efficiency, DEA, fuzzy, decision making units, higher education institutions

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Authors: А. А. Yessekeyeva, А. S. Moldagaliyeva, G. K. Shulanbekova

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The purpose of this article is to describe challenges associated with enhancement of government control over agro industrial sector in order to maintain food security. The need for government control over agricultural industry stems from the fact that the State is accountable to its citizens for establishing their standard living conditions, food and other agricultural product supplies. Agro industrial sector is in a special position within the market place preventing its full and equal participation in an interdisciplinary competition. Low-profit agricultural industry that is dependent on the natural and strongly marked seasonal and cyclical production factors is more underdeveloped in terms of technology and relatively static industry as compared to the manufacturing industry. Therefore, agricultural industry development directly affects food security of the country.

Keywords: food security, agro-industry, Kazakhstan, food security

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Authors: Nevruz Zogu, Shpetim Rezniqi

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In the framework of transformational economic development social pluralism and the free, market health systems operating in the countries of our region are naturally involved in a process of profound change and reform. Health systems actually represent complex ensembles centers and public and private institutions (domestic and foreign), who administer substantial amounts of human, technological, material, financial, information and scientific facts • The goal of health systems is much more than medical care. It includes the promotion, protection, treatment and rehabilitation of health of the population. • Meeting the needs of increasingly diverse broader health services efficient, secure the quality and affordability of their increasing cost of unstoppable, requires the necessary reform of health systems and implementing policies and new management methods, to ensure effectiveness and health benefits as higher population.

Keywords: health, management, economy, finance

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Authors: Xueli Tang, Lei Zhao, Shenghao Zhu

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This study investigates the income distribution in a dynamic assignment model with human capital accumulation and endogenous firm size. Positive assortative matching between bosses and workers arises in labor market equilibrium. We solve the stationary equilibrium of two endogenous functions, the matching rule and human capital distribution; we also decompose two channels affecting the equilibrium matching rule, firm-size effect, and endogenous distribution effect. Finally, we perform a perturbation analysis of the equilibrium matching rule and the wage function and examine the effects of technology improvement on income inequality.

Keywords: income distribution, matching, human-capital accumulation, firm size, perturbation method

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Authors: A. L. Agarwal, D. A. Mahajan

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Construction industry tumbled along with other industry/sectors during recent economic crash. Construction business could not regain thereafter and still pass through slowdown phase, resulted many real estate as well as infrastructure projects not completed on schedule and within budget. There are many theories, tools, techniques with software packages available in the market to analyze construction schedule. This study focuses on the construction project schedule and uncertainties associated with construction activities. The infrastructure construction project has been considered for the analysis of uncertainty on project activities affecting project duration and analysis is done using @RISK software. Different simulation results arising from three probability distribution functions are compiled to benefit construction project managers to plan more realistic schedule of various construction activities as well as project completion to document in the contract and avoid compensations or claims arising out of missing the planned schedule.

Keywords: construction project, distributions, project schedule, uncertainty

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Authors: Hamid Oumer Seid

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Piled raft foundation (PRF) is a union of pile and raft working together through the interaction of soil-pile, pile-raft, soil-raft and pile-pile to provide adequate bearing capacity and controlled settlement. A uniform pile positioning is used in PRF; however, there is a wide room for optimization through parametric study under vertical load to result in a safer and economical foundation. Addis Ababa is found in seismic zone 3 with a peak ground acceleration (PGA) above the threshold of damage, which makes investigating the performance of PRF under seismic load considering the dynamic kinematic soil structure interaction (SSI) vital. The study area is located in Addis Ababa around Mexico (commercial bank) and Kirkos (Nib, Zemen and United Bank) in which input parameters (pile length, pile diameter, pile spacing, raft area, raft thickness and load) are taken. A finite difference-based numerical software, FLAC3D V6, was used for the analysis. The Kobe (1995) and Northridge (1994) earthquakes were selected, and deconvolution analysis was done. A close load sharing between pile and raft was achieved at a spacing of 7D with different pile lengths and diameters. The maximum settlement reduction achieved is 9% for a pile of 2m diameter by increasing length from 10m to 20m, which shows pile length is not effective in reducing settlement. The installation of piles results in an increase in the negative bending moment of the raft compared with an unpiled raft. Hence, the optimized design depends on pile spacing and the raft edge length, while pile length and diameter are not significant parameters. An optimized piled raft configuration (𝐴𝐺/𝐴𝑅 = 0.25 at the center and piles provided around the edge) has reduced pile number by 40% and differential settlement by 95%. The dynamic analysis shows acceleration plot at the top of the piled raft has PGA of 0.25𝑚2/𝑠𝑒𝑐 and 0.63𝑚2/𝑠𝑒𝑐 for Northridge (1994) and Kobe (1995) earthquakes, respectively, due to attenuation of seismic waves. Pile head displacement (maximum is 2mm, and it is under the allowable limit) is affected by the PGA rather than the duration of an earthquake. End bearing and friction PRF performed similarly under two different earthquakes except for their vertical settlement considering SSI. Hence, PRF has shown adequate resistance to seismic loads.

Keywords: FLAC3D V6, earthquake, optimized piled raft foundation, pile head department

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Authors: Ming Luo

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In this real world, a manufacturer may produce more than one product. The products produced by the same manufacturer may share the same type of parts, similar design, and be produced in the same factory, i.e. some common causes. From the perspective of warranty management, the frequencies of those products’ warranty claims may have statistical dependence caused by the common causes. Warranty policy optimisation in the existing research, majorly, has not considered such dependence, which may increase bias in decision making. In the market, renewing warranty policies are provided to some unrepairable products and consumer electronic products. This paper optimises the renewing warranty policy collectively in a multi-product scenario with a consideration of the dependence among the warranty claims of the products produced by the same manufacturer. The existence of the optimal solution is proved. Numerical examples are used to validate the applicability of the proposed methods.

Keywords: mean-risk framework, modern portfolio theory, renewing warranty policy, warranty policy optimisation

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Authors: Baba Mbaye

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In collaborative filtering recommendation systems, a user receives suggested items based on the opinions and evaluations of a community of users. This type of recommendation system uses only the information (notes in numerical values) contained in a usage matrix as input data. This matrix can be constructed based on users' behaviors or by offering users to declare their opinions on the items they know. The cold start problem leads to very poor performance for new users. It is a phenomenon that occurs at the beginning of use, in the situation where the system lacks data to make recommendations. There are three types of cold start problems: cold start for a new item, a new system, and a new user. We are interested in this article at the cold start for a new user. When the system welcomes a new user, the profile exists but does not have enough data, and its communities with other users profiles are still unknown. This leads to recommendations not adapted to the profile of the new user. In this paper, we propose an approach that improves cold start by using the notions of similarity and semantic proximity between users profiles during cold start. We will use the cold-metadata available (metadata extracted from the new user's data) useful in positioning the new user within a community. The aim is to look for similarities and semantic proximities with the old and current user profiles of the system. Proximity is represented by close concepts considered to belong to the same group, while similarity groups together elements that appear similar. Similarity and proximity are two close but not similar concepts. This similarity leads us to the construction of similarity which is based on: a) the concepts (properties, terms, instances) independent of ontology structure and, b) the simultaneous representation of the two concepts (relations, presence of terms in a document, simultaneous presence of the authorities). We propose an ontology, OIVCSRS (Ontology of Improvement Visitor Cold Start in Recommender Systems), in order to structure the terms and concepts representing the meaning of an information field, whether by the metadata of a namespace, or the elements of a knowledge domain. This approach allows us to automatically attach the new user to a user community, partially compensate for the data that was not initially provided and ultimately to associate a better first profile with the cold start. Thus, the aim of this paper is to propose an approach to improving cold start using semantic technologies.

Keywords: visitor cold start, recommender systems, collaborative filtering, semantic filtering

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Authors: Reinhard Haas, Amela Ajanovic

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In recent years especially electricity generation from intermittent sources like wind and solar has increased remarkably. To balance electricity supply over time calls for storages has been launched. Because intermittency also exists over longer periods – months, years, especially the need for long-term electricity storages is discussed. The major conclusions of our analysis are: (i) Despite many calls for a prophylactic construction of new storage capacities with respect to all centralized long-term storage technologies the future perspectives will be much less promising than currently indicated in several papers and discussions; (ii) new long term hydro storages will not become economically attractive in general in the next decades; however, daily storages will remain the cheapest option and the most likely to be competitive; (iii) For PtG-technologies it will also become very hard to compete in the electricity markets despite a high technological learning potential. Yet, for hydrogen and methane there are prospects for use in the transport sector.

Keywords: storages, electricity markets, power-to-gas, hydro pump storages, economics

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Authors: G. Korotcenkov, V. Brinzari, B. K. Cho

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The thermoelectric properties of nano-scaled In₂O₃:Sn films deposited by spray pyrolysis are considered in the present report. It is shown that multicomponent In₂O₃:Sn-based films are promising material for the application in thermoelectric devices. It is established that the increase in the efficiency of thermoelectric conversion at C_Sn~5% occurred due to nano-scaled structure of the films studied and the effect of the grain boundary filtering of the low energy electrons. There are also analyzed the limitations that may appear during such material using in devices developed for the market of thermoelectric generators and refrigerators. Studies showed that the stability of nano-scaled film’s parameters is the main problem which can limit the application of these materials in high temperature thermoelectric converters.

Keywords: energy conversion technologies, thermoelectricity, In2O3-based films, power factor, nanocomposites, stability

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Authors: Sun Ailu, Zhao Wanmin

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In the process of rapid urbanization, old urban renewal is an important task in China's urban construction. This study, using status survey and Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method, taking Chongqing of China as an example, puts forward the problems faced by the old urban area from the aspects of function, facilities and environment. Further, this study summarizes the types of the old urban area and proposes space renewal strategies for three typical old urban areas, such as old residential area, old factory and old market. These old urban areas are confronted with the problems of functional layout confounding, lack of infrastructure and poor living environment. At last, this paper proposes spatial strategies for urban renewal, which are hoped to be useful for urban renewal management in China.

Keywords: old urban renewal, renewal mode, renewal strategy, Chongqing, China

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Authors: S. K. Gupta, Richa Bansal

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In a deregulated power system structure, power producers, and customers share a common transmission network for wheeling power from the point of generation to the point of consumption. All parties in this open access environment may try to purchase the energy from the cheaper source for greater profit margins, which may lead to overloading and congestion of certain corridors of the transmission network. This may result in violation of line flow, voltage and stability limits and thereby undermine the system security. Utilities therefore need to determine adequately their Available Transfer Capability (ATC) to ensure that system reliability is maintained while serving a wide range of bilateral and multilateral transactions. This paper presents power transfer distribution factor based on AC load flow for the determination and enhancement of ATC. The study has been carried out for IEEE 24 bus Reliability Test System.

Keywords: available transfer capability, FACTS devices, power transfer distribution factors, electric

Procedia PDF Downloads 491

Authors: Tamar Makharadze, Anastasia Kitiashvili, Irine Zhvania, Tamar Abashidze

Abstract:

After ratification of UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UN CRPD) by the Parliament of Georgia in 2013, ensuring equal access to education and employment for people with disabilities has become one of the priorities of the government. The current research has analyzed the attitudes of people with disabilities, employers and society towards various challenges that employment of persons with disabilities faces in Georgia. The study has been carried out in the capital city and three towns in West and East Georgia. Both quantitative and qualitative research methods have been used. Employers’ attitudes have been studied by analyzing research data from six focus groups and 12 in-depth interviews. Views of persons with disabilities have been analyzed relied on data from eight focus groups and 14 in-depth interviews. The quantitative study covered 490 surveyed respondents from four cities in Georgia. The research was carried out with the employees of companies selected based on the Simple Random Sample; in each company, based on the size of the company 7–10 employees were surveyed. A survey was conducted using a specially developed structured questionnaire. Data analysis was carried out using SPSS (21.0). The research was carried out during June-August 2015. The research data shows that both qualitative and quantitative research participants view employment of persons with disabilities positively; however persons with severe intellectual disabilities and mental problems are viewed as less workable and desired at workplaces. The respondents support the idea of employment of persons with disabilities at an open labour market; at the same time idea of a development of sheltered workshops is also supported. The vast majority of research participants believe that employers should be rather encouraged to hire persons with disabilities than force them to do so. For employers it is important to have the state assistance in adjusting working place to the needs of employee with disabilities. Some tax benefits for employers having employees with disabilities also are seen as encouraging employment of persons with disabilities. Both employers and persons with disabilities believe that development of job coaching will help persons with disabilities to find and maintain a job at the open market. Majority of survey respondents think that the main reasons discouraging employment of persons with disabilities in Georgia are: poor socioeconomic background and high level of unemployment in the country, absence of related state programs and existed stigma towards persons with disabilities within the society. To conclude it can be said that both employers and persons with disabilities expect initiative from the government – development of the programs and services focusing on employment of persons with disabilities that will be rather encouraging and supporting than punishing and forcing. Relied on survey data it can be said that people have positive attitudes to see persons with disabilities at workplaces, educational institutions and public places. This creates a good background for extensive and consistent work towards social inclusion of persons with disabilities in Georgia.

Keywords: supported employment, job coaching, employment of persons with disabilities in Georgia, social inclusion

Procedia PDF Downloads 340

Authors: Anchal Gupta

Abstract:

Amid the escalating digitalization and deployment of cross-border technological solutions, a significant portion of the industry and regulatory bodies have begun to pose queries concerning the formulation, computation, and contemplation of concentration risk. In the financial sector, well-established parameters exist for gauging the concentration of a portfolio and similar elements. However, a unified framework appears to be absent, which could guide industry and regulators pertaining to non-financial concentration risk. This paper introduces a framework, constructed on the foundation of multiple regulations where regulators are advocating for licensed corporations to evaluate their concentration risk. The lacuna lies in the fact that, while regulators delineate what constitutes concentration risk, unlike other domains, no guidelines are provided that could assist firms. This frequently results in ambiguity and individual corporate interpretation, which, from a risk management standpoint, is less than ideal.

Keywords: concentration risk, non-financial risk, government regulation, financial regulation, non-market risk, MAS, DORA, EDSP, SFC

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Authors: Sofia Stoica

Abstract:

In this paper, we use historical data to predict the stock price of a tech company. To this end, we use a dataset consisting of the stock prices in the past five years of ten major tech companies – Adobe, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Netflix, Oracle, Salesforce, and Tesla. We experimented with a variety of models– a linear regressor model, K nearest Neighbors (KNN), a sequential neural network – and algorithms - Multiplicative Weight Update, and AdaBoost. We found that the sequential neural network performed the best, with a testing error of 0.18%. Interestingly, the linear model performed the second best with a testing error of 0.73%. These results show that using historical data is enough to obtain high accuracies, and a simple algorithm like linear regression has a performance similar to more sophisticated models while taking less time and resources to implement.

Keywords: finance, machine learning, opening price, stock market

Procedia PDF Downloads 172

Authors: Hsiu-Hua Cheng

Abstract:

In recent years, the number of social-oriented virtual communities users has increased significantly. Corporate investment in advertising on social-oriented virtual communities increases quickly. With the gigantic commercial value of the digital market, competitions between virtual communities are keen. In this context, how to retain existing customers to continue using social-oriented virtual communities is an urgent issue for virtual community managers. This study employs the perspective of automaticity mechanism and combines the social embeddedness theory with the literature of involvement and habit in order to explore antecedents of users’ continuous usage on social-oriented virtual communities. The results can be a reference for scholars and managers of social-oriented virtual communities.

Keywords: continued usage, habit, social embeddedness, involvement, virtual community

Procedia PDF Downloads 413