How can SMEs benefit from big data? Challenges and a path forward

Big data is big news, and large companies in all sectors are making significant advances in their customer relations, product selection and development and consequent profitability through using this valuable commodity. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have proved themselves to be slow adopters of the new technology of big data analytics and are in danger of being left behind. In Europe, SMEs are a vital part of the economy, and the challenges they encounter need to be addressed as a matter of urgency. This paper identifies barriers to SME uptake of big data analytics and recognises their complex challenge to all stakeholders, including national and international policy makers, IT, business management and data science communities. The paper proposes a big data maturity model for SMEs as a first step towards an SME roadmap to data analytics. It considers the ‘state-of-the-art’ of IT with respect to usability and usefulness for SMEs and discusses how SMEs can overcome the barriers preventing them from adopting existing solutions. The paper then considers management perspectives and the role of maturity models in enhancing and structuring the adoption of data analytics in an organisation. The history of total quality management is reviewed to inform the core aspects of implanting a new paradigm. The paper concludes with recommendations to help SMEs develop their big data capability and enable them to continue as the engines of European industrial and business success. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Current usage of Component based Principles for Developing Web Applications with Frameworks: A Literature Review

Component based software development has become a very popular paradigm in many software engineering branches. In the early phase of Web 2.0 appearance, it was also popular for web application development. From the analyzed papers, between this period and today, use of component based techniques for web application development was somewhat slowed down, however, the recent development indicates a comeback. Most of all it is apparent with W3C’s component web working group. In this article we want to investigate the current state of web application development with component approach. Most of all we are interested in which way components are used, which web development frameworks are being used, for which domains is component based web development most popular and successful, etc. How many current web development frameworks explicitly refer to component-based approach? To answer this question, we performed a literature review

Second CLIPS Conference Proceedings, volume 1

Topics covered at the 2nd CLIPS Conference held at the Johnson Space Center, September 23-25, 1991 are given. Topics include rule groupings, fault detection using expert systems, decision making using expert systems, knowledge representation, computer aided design and debugging expert systems

Pragmatic Design: A Case Study of Innovation in a Small Software Company

The research question that underpins this paper is ‘What are the novel features of IS design practice ‘in the wild’? In order to help answer this question, a theoretical perspective that focuses on practitioners’ ‘situated practical theory’ in the ‘co-production’ of IS designs is adopted. The context for this study is that firms operating in the IT sector face particular challenges in navigating the complex web of global regulatory requirements. Accordingly, practitioners indicate the need for IT artefacts to informate and help automate compliance processes in organizations. This paper reports on the design of an innovative IT artefact called Compliance-to-Product (C2P), which is argued to be in the vanguard of a new breed of IS called Compliance Knowledge Management Systems (CKMS). The paper describes how this IT artefact was designed by a small-to-medium sized software enterprise, whose design architecture originated in the ‘situated practical theory’ of the company’s founder. However, the findings illustrate that the detailed design was ‘co-produced’ by a network of social actors from collaborating organizations and that this emerged over time. The paper’s concluding observation is that the findings pose a question for design science and the claims for its ability to shape design practice

A reference model for information specification for metalworking SMEs

The work reported in this thesis offers a novel basis for the realisation of specifications for information requirements to meet the distinct operational requirements of metalworking SMEs. This has been achieved through the development of a reference SME enterprise model based on fundamental ideas of the holon and fractal factory concepts. The novel concept of a node holon is introduced, which allows the representation of the human dominated interactions in a company based on the fundamental concepts of the holon. This offers a competitive alternative to the methods for enterprise modelling and information specification which are based solely around business processes and procedural rules. A new representation for the organisation of the SME has been based on identifying the major zones of activity within the enterprise, which is seen to provide a more appropriate representation for companies whose basis for operation is informally structured. Two classes of zones have been identified, these are the business support zone and manufacturing zone. The relationship between a top down description of the enterprise as zones and the complementary bottoms up modelling of the enterprise based on concepts of the node holon are described in detail. A critical study of two candidate modelling architectures, namely CIN40SA and ARIS will show the applicability of the individual architectures for the task information specification. The constituents of the SMEE enterprise reference model is placed within the context of contemporary enterprise modelling practice by mapping against one of the architectures. This will demonstrate how the architectures can readily accommodate new modelling approaches whilst retaining their major advantages, thereby increasing their applicability and potential uptake. The reference SME enterprise model has been readily applied in the study of an SME, where a representation of the company has been achieved solely on the current organisation of its business support and manufacturing activities. The holonic aspects of the enterprise have also been successfully modelled. This process is supported by a CASE tool which has it constructs underpinned by the reference SME enterprise model