Search results for: architectural firms

Authors: Randolf Von N. Salindo

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The study was conducted to measure the logistics integration capabilities of selected companies in the Bahrain construction industry using the Supply Chain 2000 framework; and, determine the extent and direction of influence of these logistics capabilities and integration competencies on the supply chain performance of the firm. A total of 50 executive respondents (from supervisor to managing director level) from 22 construction and construction supplier firms participated in the study from September to November 2014. The results reveal that respondent Bahraini construction firms have significantly lower levels of logistics capabilities, but higher levels of logistics integration competencies compared to international benchmarks. Using stepwise multiple regression analysis, eight logistics capabilities of Bahraini constructions firms were identified to be positively associated with firm performance; with comprehensive metrics as the most positively dominant influential logistics capability. Activity based and total cost methodology is found to be the most negatively dominant influential logistics capability. In terms of logistics integration competencies, the study revealed that that customer integration, internal integration, and, measurement integration are negatively associated with firm performance. There was no logistics integration competency found to be positively associated with the supply chain performance among the companies who participated in the study. The research reveals that there are areas for improvement in supply chain capabilities and logistics integration competencies of the construction firms in the Kingdom of Bahrain to improve their supply chain performance to a global level.

Keywords: comprehensive metrics, customer integration, logistics integration capabilities, logistics integration competencies

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Authors: Hamidreza Fallah Lajimi , Elham Karami, Fatemeh Ali nasab, Mostafa Mahdavikia

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Being responsive is an increasingly important skill for firms in today’s global economy; thus firms must be agile. Naturally, it follows that an organization’s agility depends on its supply chain being agile. However, achieving supply chain agility is a function of other abilities within the organization. This paper analyses results from a survey of 71 Iran manufacturing companies in order to identify some of the factors for agile organizations in managing their supply chains. Then we classification this company in four cluster with fuzzy c-mean technique and with four validations functional determine automatically the optimal number of clusters.

Keywords: agile supply chain, clustering, fuzzy clustering

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Authors: Ing-Jen Hung, Tzu-Chien Wang

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Nowadays, customers can interact with firms through miscellaneous online ads on different channels easily. In other words, customer now has innumerable options and limitless time to accomplish their commercial activities with firms, individualizing their own online customer journey. This kind of convenience emphasizes the importance of online advertisement allocation on different channels. Therefore, profound understanding of customer behavior can make considerable benefit from optimizing fund allocation on diverse ad channels. To achieve this objective, multiple firms utilize numerical methodology to create data-driven advertisement policy. In our research, we aim to exploit online customer click data to discover the correlations between each channel and their sequential relations. We use LSTM to deal with sequential property of our data and compare its accuracy with other non-sequential methods, such as CART decision tree, logistic regression, etc. Besides, we also classify our customers into several groups by their behavioral characteristics to perceive the differences between all groups as customer portrait. As a result, we discover distinct customer journey under each customer portrait. Our article provides some insights into marketing research and can help firm to formulate online advertising criteria.

Keywords: LSTM, customer journey, marketing, channel ads

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Authors: Shuofen Hsu, Ya-Yi Chao, Chao-Wei Li

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This paper investigates the relationship between voluntary audit (hereafter, VA) of semi-annual consolidated financial statements decision and accounting conservatism. In general, there are four kinds of auditors' assurance services, which include audit, review, agreed-upon procedure and compliance engagements base on degree of assurance. The VA work by auditors may not only have the higher audit quality but an important signal of more reliable information than the review work. In Taiwan, The listed companies must prepare the semi-annual consolidated financial statements and with auditors' review before 2012, but some of the listed companies choose the assurance work from review to audit voluntarily. Due to the adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards, the listed companies were required to prepare the second quarterly consolidated financial statements which should be reviewed by auditors since 2013. This rule will change some of the assurance work from audit to review by auditors, and the information asymmetry maybe increased. To control the selection bias, we use two-stage model to test the relationship between VA decision and accounting conservatism. Our empirical results indicate that the VA decision and accounting conservatism have a significant positive relationship in firms with family-controlled. That is, firms with family-controlled are more likely to do VA and to prepare more conservative consolidated financial statements to reduce the information asymmetry, meaning that there is a complementary effect between VA and accounting conservatism for firms with more information asymmetry. But on the contrary, we find that the VA decision and accounting conservatism have a significant negative relationship in firms with professional managers-controlled, meaning that there is a substitution effect between VA and accounting conservatism for firms with less information asymmetry. Finally, the accounting conservatism of consolidated financial statements decrease after the adoption of IFRSs (International Financial Reporting Standards) in Taiwan. It means that the disclosure and transparency of consolidated financial statements had be improved.

Keywords: voluntary audit, accounting conservatism, audit quality, information asymmetry

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Authors: Nandini Mukhopadhyay

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The prominence of terracotta as a building material in Bengal is well justified by its geographical location. The architectural knowledge system associated with terracotta can be comprehended in the typology of the built structures as they act as texts to interpret the knowledge. The history of Bengal has witnessed the influence of several rulers in developing the architectural vocabulary of the region. This metamorphosis of the architectural knowledge systems in the region includes the Bhakti movement, the Islamic influence, and the British rule, which led to the evolution of the use of terracotta from decorative elements to structural elements in the present-day context. This paper intends to develop an understanding of terracotta as a building material, its use in a built structure, the common problems associated with terracotta construction, and the techniques of maintenance, repair, and conservation. This paper also explores the size, shape, and geometry of the material and its varied use in temples, mosques in the region. It also takes into note that the use of terracotta was concentrated majorly to religious structures and not in the settlements of the common people. And the architectural style of temples and mosques of Bengal is hugely influenced by the houses of the common.

Keywords: terracotta, material, knowledge system, conservation

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Authors: Eliane Abdo

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Small and medium sized firms “SMEs” play essential role in the countries’ economic development mainly in terms of production, employment and equitable distribution of income. For innovative SMEs, the investment in the human capital and in research and development are crucial to survive in a competitive environment. In this paper we perform a literature review to underline the financing difficulties and constraints which innovative SMEs face while investing in intangible assets: not only when defining amount of the investments but also while choosing its financing methods. Literature review revealed that in order to finance their intangible assets, SMEs rely in first on their internal financing: the availability of internal cash flows can then determine their investment’s decision. Moreover SMEs face difficulties to finance their intangibles by financial debts due to the uncertainty of future cash flow and the absence of physical guarantees; they will therefore go for the issuance of new shares as a second choice, since innovative companies have high opportunity of growth that attract new shareholders.

Keywords: small and medium sized firms, capital structure, intangible investment, financial constraints

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Authors: Š. Čemerková, M. Wilczková

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The paper deals with the importance of information flow for providing of defined level of customer service in the firms. Setting of the criteria for the selection and implementation of logistics information system is a prerequisite for ensuring of the flow of information in firms. The decision on the selection and implementation of logistics information system is linked to the investment costs and operating costs, which are included in the total logistics costs. The article also deals with the conclusions of the research focused on the logistics information system selection in companies in the Czech Republic.

Keywords: customer service, information system, logistics, research

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Authors: Halimi Mohamed Taher, Kordoghli Bassem, Ben Hassen Mohamed, Sakli Faouzi

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Textile and clothing manufacturing industry is based largely on subcontracting system. Choosing the right subcontractor became a strategic decision that can affect the financial position of the company and even his market position. Subcontracting firms in Tunisia are lead to define an appropriate selection process which takes into account several quantitative and qualitative criteria. In this study, a methodology is proposed that includes a Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) in order to incorporate the ambiguities and uncertainties in qualitative decision. Best subcontractors for two Tunisian firms are determined based on model results.

Keywords: AHP, subcontractor, multicriteria, selection

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Authors: Bhumika Gupta, Jeayaram Subramanian, Hardik Vachhrajani, Avinash Shivdas

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Indian food processing industry is one of the largest in the world in terms of production, consumption, exports and growth opportunities. SMEs play a crucial role within this. Large manufacturing firms largely dominate innovation studies in India. Innovation sources used by SMEs are often different from that of large firms. This paper focuses on exploring various sources of innovation adopted by food processing SMEs in Kerala, South India. Outcome suggests that SMEs use various sources like suppliers, competitors, employees, government/research institutions and customers to get new ideas.

Keywords: food processing, innovation, SMEs, sources of innovation

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Authors: Ömer Akkaya, Muammer Zerenler

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Ethics is important for all shareholders and stakeholders that a firm has in its environment. Whether a firm behaves ethically or unethically has a significant influence on consumers’ decision making and buying process. This research tries to explain business ethics from consumers’ perspective. The survey includes several questions to explain how consumers react if they know a firm behave unethically or ethically. What are consumers’ expectations regarding the ethical behavior of firm? Do consumer reward or punish the firms considering the ethics? Does it really important for consumers firms behaving ethical?

Keywords: business ethics, consumer behavior, ethics, social responsibility

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Authors: Aharouay Soumaya

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Efficiency is a relative concept. It is measured by comparing the productivity obtained in what is intended as standard or objective criteria. The quantity and quality of output achieved and the level of service are also compared to targets or standards, to determine to what extent they could cause changes in efficiency. Efficiency improves when more outputs of a specified quality are produced with the same resource inputs or less, or when the same amount of output is produced with fewer resources. This article proposes a review of the literature on strategies adopted by firms in the age of the financial crisis to overcome these negative effects, and tracks progress chosen by the organization to remain successful despite the plight of firms.

Keywords: effectiveness, efficiency, organizational capacity, strategy, management tool, progress, performance

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Authors: Yue Xu

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This paper establishes the fund manager’s capital raising ability as an important managerial skill that fund firms exploit to generate higher firm revenues. Fund firms reallocate fund managers with high capital raising ability to other funds with large outflows. Investors demand the capital raising ability of managers and reward it by investing more capital despite lower future alphas. A team with a larger experience difference between reallocated managers and existing managers attracts more capital inflows, suggesting that there is a synergy effect on the fund manager’s capital raising ability.

Keywords: mutual fund, manager, fund firm, reallocation, revenue

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Authors: Hochan Seok, Woosik Jang, Seung-Heon Han

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The stagnant global construction market has intensified competition since 2008 among firms that aim to win overseas contracts. Against this backdrop, subcontractor selection is identified as one of the most critical success factors in overseas construction project. However, it is difficult to select qualified subcontractors due to the lack of evaluation standards and reliability. This study aims to identify the problems associated with existing subcontractor evaluations using a correlations analysis and a multiple regression analysis with pre-qualification and performance evaluation of 121 firms in six countries.

Keywords: subcontractor evaluation system, pre-qualification, performance evaluation, correlation analysis, multiple regression analysis

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Authors: Logaiswari Indiran, Zainab Khalifah, Kamariah Ismail

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Business incubators have now been recognized as effective tools in providing business assistance to start-up firms. In both developed and developing countries, the number of incubators is growing tremendously. As the birth rate of incubators increases, so do its challenges. Malaysia, as one of the developing countries in the Asian continent, has also established a number of business incubators to breed and foster the growth and survival of start-up firms. Thus, this study discusses the incubation model applied in Malaysia and the challenges faced by these incubators using secondary data including policies, previous literature, and reports related to Malaysian incubators. The findings of this study call the government to rethink the key role of incubator managers and staffs, internal structure of the incubator concept and process, intellectual properties management, strategic alliances with universities-industries and funding supports in enhancing the support provided by the business incubators in Malaysia. The key challenges highlighted in this study signal important policy lessons for other developing countries that aim to create and map an effective business incubator ecosystem.

Keywords: business incubators, incubation challenges, funding support, incubator managers, internal structure, start-up firms

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Authors: Renata Konadu

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Over the last two decades, the concept of environmental management and its related issues have received increased attention in global discourse and on management research agenda due to climate change and other environmental challenges. To abate and avert these challenges, diverse environmental policies, strategies and practices have been adopted by businesses and economies as a whole. Extant literature has placed much emphasis on whether improved environmental operational performance improves firm performance. However, there is a huge gap in the literature with regards to whether the adoption of environmental management practices and policies has a direct relationship with environmental operational performance (EOP). The current paper is intended to provide a comprehensive perspective of how different aspects of environmental management can relate to firms EOP. Using a panel regression analysis of 149 large listed firms in the UK, the study found evidence of both negative and positive statistically significant link between some Environmental Policies (EP), Environmental Processes (EPR), Environmental Management Systems (EMS) and EOP. The findings suggest that in terms of relating EP, EPR and EMS to Greenhouse Gases (GHGs) emissions for instance, the latter should be viewed separately in Scopes 1, 2 and 3 as developed by GHG protocol. The results have useful implication for policy makers and managers when designing strategies and policies to reduce negative environmental impacts.

Keywords: environmental management, environmental operational performance, GHGs, large listed firms

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Authors: Eda Orhun

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Purpose: This paper analyzes a target firm’s decision to voluntarily disclose information during a takeover event and the effect of such disclosures on the outcome of the takeover. Such voluntary disclosures especially in the form of earnings forecasts made around takeover events may affect shareholders’ decisions about the target firm’s value and in return takeover result. This study aims to shed light on this question. Design/methodology/approach: The paper tries to understand the role of voluntary disclosures by target firms during a takeover event in the likelihood of takeover success both theoretically and empirically. A game-theoretical model is set up to analyze the voluntary disclosure decision of a target firm to inform the shareholders about its real worth. The empirical implication of model is tested by employing binary outcome models where the disclosure variable is obtained by identifying the target firms in the sample that provide positive news by issuing increasing management earnings forecasts. Findings: The model predicts that a voluntary disclosure of positive information by the target decreases the likelihood that the takeover succeeds. The empirical analysis confirms this prediction by showing that positive earnings forecasts by target firms during takeover events increase the probability of takeover failure. Overall, it is shown that information dissemination through voluntary disclosures by target firms is an important factor affecting takeover outcomes. Originality/Value: This study is the first to the author's knowledge that studies the impact of voluntary disclosures by the target firm during a takeover event on the likelihood of takeover success. The results contribute to information economics, corporate finance and M&As literatures.

Keywords: takeovers, target firm, voluntary disclosures, earnings forecasts, takeover success

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Authors: Gamze Atay, Altay Colak

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It is a fact that today's technology shapes the change and development of architectural forms by creating different perspectives. The research is an experimental study that explores the integration of architectural forms in this process of change/development into design education through traditional design tools. An examination of the practices in the studio environment shows that the students who just started architectural education have difficulty accessing the form. The main objective of this study has been to enable students to use and interpret different disciplines in the design process to improve their perception of form. In this sense, the origami, which is defined as "the art of paper folding", and isomorphous (equally formed) approaches have been used with design studio students at the beginning stage as methods in the process of 3-dimensional thinking and creating the form. These two methods were examined with students in three stages: analysis, creation, and outcome. As a result of the study, it was seen that the use of different disciplines as a method during form creation gave the designs of the student originality, freedom, and dynamism.

Keywords: architectural form, design education, isomorphic approach, origamic approach

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Authors: Uğur Tuztaşi, Mehmet Uysal, Yavuz Arat

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The tomb (grave) structures that have influenced the architectural culture from the Seljuk times to the Ottoman throughout Anatolia are members of a continuing building tradition in terms of monumental expression and styles. This building typology which has religious and cultural permeability in view of spatial traces and structural formations follows the entire trajectory of the respect to death and the deceased from the Seljuks to the Ottomans and also the changing burial traditions epitomised in the form of mausoleums in the Turkish Republic. Although the cultural layers have the same contents with regards to the cult of monument this architectural tradition which evolved from tombs to mausoleums changed in both typological formation and structural size. In short, the tomb tradition with unique examples of architectural functions and typological formations has been encountered from 13th century onwards and continued during the Ottoman period with changes in form and has transformed to mausoleums during the 20th century. This study analyses the process of transformation from complex structures to simple structures and then to monumental graves in terms of architectural expression. Moreover, the study interrogates the architectural language of Anatolian Seljuk tombs to Ottoman tombs and monumental graves built during the republican period in terms of spatial and structural contexts.

Keywords: death and space in Turks, monumental graves, language of architectural style, morphological transformations

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Authors: Nizar Mansour, Chiha Gaha, Emna Gara

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The present research investigates the relationship among HRM practices, knowledge sharing behavior and a certain number of intermediary variables in the context of Tunisian knowledge-intensive firms. Results suggest that five HR practices influence either directly or indirectly the knowledge sharing behavior through enhancing the value of human capital and fostering a learning-oriented organizational climate. Results have strong theoretical implications for both the fields of knowledge management and strategic human resource management. Managerial implications are also derived.

Keywords: human capital, knowledge intensive firms, knowledge sharing, organizational climate, Tunisia

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Authors: Ichiro Takahashi

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One conundrum that macroeconomic theory faces is to explain how an economy can revive from depression, in which the aggregate demand has fallen substantially below its productive capacity. This paper examines an autonomous stabilizing mechanism using an agent-based Wicksell-Keynes macroeconomic model. This paper focuses on the effects of the number of firms and the length of the gestation period for investment that are often assumed to be one in a mainstream macroeconomic model. The simulations found the virtual economy was highly unstable, or more precisely, collapsing when these parameters are fixed at one. This finding may even suggest us to question the legitimacy of these common assumptions. A perpetual decline in capital stock will eventually encourage investment if the capital stock is short-lived because an inactive investment will result in insufficient productive capacity. However, for an economy characterized by a roundabout production method, a gradual decline in productive capacity may not be able to fall below the aggregate demand that is also shrinking. Naturally, one would then ask if our economy cannot rely on an external stimulus such as population growth and technological progress to revive investment, what factors would provide such a buoyancy for stimulating investments? The current paper attempts to answer this question by employing the artificial macroeconomic model mentioned above. The baseline model has the following three features: (1) the multi-period gestation for investment, (2) a large number of heterogeneous firms, (3) demand-constrained firms. The instability is a consequence of the following dynamic interactions. (a) A multiple-period gestation period means that once a firm starts a new investment, it continues to invest over some subsequent periods. During these gestation periods, the excess demand created by the investing firm will spill over to ignite new investment of other firms that are supplying investment goods: the presence of multi-period gestation for investment provides a field for investment interactions. Conversely, the excess demand for investment goods tends to fade away before it develops into a full-fledged boom if the gestation period of investment is short. (b) A strong demand in the goods market tends to raise the price level, thereby lowering real wages. This reduction of real wages creates two opposing effects on the aggregate demand through the following two channels: (1) a reduction in the real labor income, and (2) an increase in the labor demand due to the principle of equality between the marginal labor productivity and real wage (referred as the Walrasian labor demand). If there is only a single firm, a lower real wage will increase its Walrasian labor demand, thereby an actual labor demand tends to be determined by the derived labor demand. Thus, the second positive effect would not work effectively. In contrast, for an economy with a large number of firms, Walrasian firms will increase employment. This interaction among heterogeneous firms is a key for stability. A single firm cannot expect the benefit of such an increased aggregate demand from other firms.

Keywords: agent-based macroeconomic model, business cycle, demand constraint, gestation period, representative agent model, stability

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Authors: Muhammad Irfan Marwat, Sadaqat Jan, Syed Zafar Ali Shah

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Software architecture plays a key role in software development but absence of formal description of software architecture causes different impede in software development. To cope with these difficulties, ontology has been used as artifact. This paper proposes ontology for software architectural design based on IEEE model for architecture description and Kruchten 4+1 model for viewpoints classification. For categorization of style and views, ISO/IEC 42010 has been used. Corpus method has been used to evaluate ontology. The main aim of the proposed ontology is to classify and locate software architectural design information.

Keywords: semantic-based software architecture, software architecture, ontology, software engineering

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Authors: Marzieh Khaleghi Baygi, Maryam Khaleghy Baygy

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The main aim of this project was designing and making sustainable architectural wearable dress inspired by reconstruction project of Bam’s Bazar in Iran. To achieve the goals of this project, Bam Bazar became the architectural reference. A mixed research method (including applied, qualitative and case studies methods) was used. After research, data gathering and considering related intellectual, mental and cultural background, the garment was modeled by using 3ds Max's modeling tools and Marvelous. After making the pattern, the wearable architecture was built and an architectural and historical building converted to a clothing. The implementation of sustainable architectural clothing, took seventeen months. The result of this project was a cloth in a new form that had been worn on its architect body. The comparison between present project and previous research were focusing on the same subjects (architectural clothing) shows some dramatic differentiations, including, the architect, designer and executive of this project was the same person who was the main researcher. Also, in this research, special attention was paid to the sustainability, volume and forms. Most projects in this subject (especially pervious related Iranian research) relied on painting and not on the volumes and forms. The sustainable immovable architecture had worn on its architect, became a cloth on a human's body that was moving.

Keywords: wearable architecture, clothing, bam bazar, space, sustainability

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Authors: Raed Hanandeh

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This empirical study examines how knowledge sharing behaviors mediate the effect Technology-driven strategy on virtual organization success in Jordanian tourism sector firms. The results reveal that Social network ties are positively related to web knowledge seeking, web knowledge contributing and interactive system, but negatively related to accidental knowledge leakage. Furthermore, all types of knowledge sharing behavior are positively related to virtual organization success. Data collected from 23 firms. The total number of questionnaires mailed, 250 questionnaires were delivered. 214 were considered valid out of 241 Responses were received. The findings provide evidence that knowledge sharing behavior play a mediating role between Social network ties and virtual organization success and show that, web knowledge seeking, web knowledge contributing and interactive system playing an important impact on virtual organization success through knowledge sharing behaviors.

Keywords: social network ties, virtual organization success, knowledge sharing behaviors, web knowledge

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Authors: Adèle Oliva, Samuel Fosso Wamba

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This study looks at how firms can create competitive advantages through effective reserve logistics strategies. Upon using data collected from reverse supply chain managers of electronic commerce companies, the study found that improved reverse logistics management can have a positive impact on companies’ business benefits. These include playing a role in the implementation of many factors that highly influence the decision to purchase, customers’ loyalty, as well as increasing companies’ turnover. As a result, through an efficient design and management of their reverse flow, companies can decrease the costs associated to returned products.

Keywords: reverse logistics, competitive advantage, case study, business value

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Authors: S. Ping Ho, R. Dahal

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The global economy has drastically changed how firms operate and compete. Although the construction industry is ‘local’ by its nature, the internationalization of the construction industry has become an inevitable reality. As a result of global competition, staying domestic is no longer safe from competition and, on the contrary, to grow and become an MNE (multi-national enterprise) becomes one of the important strategies for a firm to survive in the global competition. For the successful entrance into competing markets, the firms need to re-define their competitive advantages and re-identify the sources of the competitive advantages. A firm’s initiation of internationalization is not necessarily a result of strategic planning but also involves certain idiosyncratic events that pave the path leading to a firm’s internationalization. For example, a local firm’s incidental or unintentional collaboration with an MNE can become the initiating point of its internationalization process. However, because of the intensive competition in today’s global movement, many firms were compelled to initiate their internationalization as a strategic response to the competition. Understandingly stepping in in the process of internationalization and appropriately implementing the strategies (in the process) at different stages lead the construction firms to a successful internationalization journey. This study is carried out to develop a model of the internationalization process, which derives appropriate strategies that the construction firms can implement at each stage. The proposed model integrates two major and complementary views of internationalization and expresses the dynamic process of internationalization in three stages, which are the pre-international (PRE) stage, the foreign direct investment (FDI) stage, and the multi-national enterprise (MNE) stage. The strategies implied in the proposed model are derived, focusing on capability building, market locations, and entry modes based on the resource-based views: value, rareness, imitability, and substitutability (VRIN). With the proposed dynamic process model the potential construction firms which are willing to expand their business market area can be benefitted. Strategies for internationalization, such as core competence strategy, market selection, partner selection, and entry mode strategy, can be derived from the proposed model. The internationalization process is expressed in two different forms. First, we discuss the construction internationalization process, identify the driving factor/s of the process, and explain the strategy formation in the process. Second, we define the stages of internationalization along the process and the corresponding strategies in each stage. The strategies may include how to exploit existing advantages for the competition at the current stage and develop or explore additional advantages appropriate for the next stage. Particularly, the additionally developed advantages will then be accumulated and drive forward the firm’s stage of internationalization, which will further determine the subsequent strategies, and so on and so forth, spiraling up the stages of a higher degree of internationalization. However, the formation of additional strategies for the next stage does not happen automatically, and the strategy evolution is based on the firm’s dynamic capabilities.

Keywords: construction industry, dynamic capabilities, internationalization process, internationalization strategies, strategic management

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Authors: Lopamudra D. Satpathy, Bani Chatterjee, Jitendra Mahakud

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The rapid economic growth in terms of output and investment necessitates a substantial growth of Total Factor Productivity (TFP) of firms which is an indicator of an economy’s technological change. The strong empirical relationship between financial sector development and economic growth clearly indicates that firms financing decisions do affect their levels of output via their investment decisions. Hence it establishes a linkage between the financial factors and productivity growth of the firms. To achieve the smooth and continuous economic growth over time, it is imperative to understand the financial channel that serves as one of the vital channels. The theoretical or logical argument behind this linkage is that when the internal financial capital is not sufficient enough for the investment, the firms always rely upon the external sources of finance. But due to the frictions and existence of information asymmetric behavior, it is always costlier for the firms to raise the external capital from the market, which in turn affect their investment sentiment and productivity. This kind of financial position of the firms puts heavy pressure on their productive activities. Keeping in view this theoretical background, the present study has tried to analyze the role of both external and internal financial factors (leverage, cash flow and liquidity) on the determination of total factor productivity of the firms of manufacturing industry and its sub-industries, maintaining a set of firm specific variables as control variables (size, age and disembodied technological intensity). An estimate of total factor productivity of the Indian manufacturing industry and sub-industries is computed using a semi-parametric approach, i.e., Levinsohn- Petrin method. It establishes the relationship between financial factors and productivity growth of 652 firms using a dynamic panel GMM method covering the time period between 1997-98 and 2012-13. From the econometric analyses, it has been found that the internal cash flow has a positive and significant impact on the productivity of overall manufacturing sector. The other financial factors like leverage and liquidity also play the significant role in the determination of total factor productivity of the Indian manufacturing sector. The significant role of internal cash flow on determination of firm-level productivity suggests that access to external finance is not available to Indian companies easily. Further, the negative impact of leverage on productivity could be due to the less developed bond market in India. These findings have certain implications for the policy makers to take various policy reforms to develop the external bond market and easily workout through which the financially constrained companies will be able to raise the financial capital in a cost-effective manner and would be able to influence their investments in the highly productive activities, which would help for the acceleration of economic growth.

Keywords: dynamic panel, financial factors, manufacturing sector, total factor productivity

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Authors: Ahmed Radwan, Ahmed Abdel Ghaney

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This paper delves into the transformative potential of artificial intelligence (AI) in fostering creativity within the domain of architecture education, especially with a specific emphasis on its implications within the Design Studios; the convergence of AI and architectural pedagogy has introduced avenues for redefining the boundaries of creative expression and problem-solving. By harnessing AI-driven tools, students and educators can collaboratively explore a spectrum of design possibilities, stimulate innovative ideation, and engage in multidimensional design processes. This paper investigates the ways in which AI contributes to architectural creativity by facilitating generative design, pattern recognition, virtual reality experiences, and sustainable design optimization. Furthermore, the study examines the balance between AI-enhanced creativity and the preservation of core principles of architectural design/education, ensuring that technology is harnessed to augment rather than replace foundational design skills. Through an exploration of Egypt's architectural heritage and contemporary challenges, this research underscores how AI can synergize with cultural context and historical insights to inspire cutting-edge architectural solutions. By analyzing AI's impact on nurturing creativity among Egyptian architecture students, this paper seeks to contribute to the ongoing discourse on the integration of technology within global architectural education paradigms. It is hoped that this research will guide the thoughtful incorporation of AI in fostering creativity while preserving the authenticity and richness of architectural design education in Egypt and beyond.

Keywords: architecture, artificial intelligence, architecture education, Egypt

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Authors: Noor Hasmini Abdghani, Nik Kamariah Nikmat, Nor Hayati Ahmad

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Rapid growth of the internet technology led to changes in the consumer lifestyles. This involved customer buying behaviour-based internet that create new kind of buying strategy. Hence, it has summoned many of world firms including Malaysia to generate new quality strategy in preparation to face new customer buying lifestyles. Particularly, this study focused on identifying online customer segment of automobile passenger car customers. Secondly, the objective is to understand online customer’s receptiveness towards internet technologies. This study distributed 700 questionnaires whereby 582 were returned representing 83% response rate. The data were analysed using factor and regression analyses. The result from the factor analysis precipitates four online passenger car segmentations in Malaysia, which are: Segment (1)- Automobile Online shopping Preferences, Segment (2)- Automobile Online Brand Comparison, Segment (3)- Automobile Online Information Seeking and Segment (4)- Automobile Offline Shopping Preferences. In understanding the online customer’s receptiveness towards internet, the regression result shows that there is significant relationship between each of four segments of online passenger car customer with attitude towards automobile online shopping. This implies that, for online customers to have receptiveness toward internet technologies, he or she must have preferences toward online shopping or at least prefer to browse any related information online even if the actual purchase is made at the traditional store. With this proposed segmentation strategy, the firms especially the automobile firms will be able to understand their online customer behavior. At least, the proposed segmentation strategy will help the firms to strategize quality management approach for their online customers’ buying decision making.

Keywords: Automobile, Market Segmentation, Online Shopping Attitude, Quality Management Strategy

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Authors: Ihjaz Zubair Pallakkan Tharammal, Lakshmi S. R.

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Storytelling has been an important part of human life over the course of history. It allows corporations to unlearn, examine and relearn. There are unique mediums of storytelling which can be used in an individual's normal life. For instance, the mind is shared through oral stories, comics, music, art, shape, etc. The research dreams of studying and looking at the ability of museums and the importance of incorporating architectural narratives in museums, mainly in 21st-century India. The research is also an exploratory and comparative assessment of narrative elements like semiotics, symbolism, spatial form, etc., and in the long run, derives strategies to format regions that communicate to the users.

Keywords: museum, architectural narrative, narratology, spatial storytelling

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Authors: Pulkeria Pascoe, Hawa P. Tundui, Marcia Dutra de Barcellos, Hans de Steur, Xavier Gellynck

Abstract:

A majority of Micro and Small Enterprises (MSEs) experience low or no growth. Understanding their performance remains unfinished and disjointed as there is no consensus on the factors influencing it, especially in developing countries. Using a Resource-Based View (RBV) as the theoretical background, this cross-sectional study employed four regression models to examine the influence of firm-level factors (firm-specific characteristics, firm resources, manager socio-demographic characteristics, and selected management practices) on the overall performance variations among 442 Tanzanian micro and small agri-food processing firms. Study results confirmed the RBV argument that intangible resources make a larger contribution to overall performance variations among firms than that tangible resources. Firms' tangible and intangible resources explained 34.5% of overall performance variations (intangible resources explained the overall performance variability by 19.4% compared to tangible resources, which accounted for 15.1%), ranking first in explaining the overall performance variance. Firm-specific characteristics ranked second by influencing variations in overall performance by 29.0%. Selected management practices ranked third (6.3%), while the manager's socio-demographic factors were last on the list, as they influenced the overall performance variability among firms by only 5.1%. The study also found that firms that focus on proper utilization of tangible resources (financial and physical), set targets, and undertake better working capital management practices performed higher than their counterparts (low and average performers). Furthermore, accumulation and proper utilization of intangible resources (relational, organizational, and reputational), undertaking performance monitoring practices, age of the manager, and the choice of the firm location and activity were the dominant significant factors influencing the variations among average and high performers, relative to low performers. The entrepreneurial background was a significant factor influencing variations in average and low-performing firms, indicating that entrepreneurial skills are crucial to achieving average levels of performance. Firm age, size, legal status, source of start-up capital, gender, education level, and total business experience of the manager were not statistically significant variables influencing the overall performance variations among the agri-food processors under the study. The study has identified both significant and non-significant factors influencing performance variations among low, average, and high-performing micro and small agri-food processing firms in Tanzania. Therefore, results from this study will help managers, policymakers and researchers to identify areas where more attention should be placed in order to improve overall performance of MSEs in agri-food industry.

Keywords: firm-level factors, micro and small enterprises, performance, regression analysis, resource-based-view

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